#ALSO HOW DID THIS END UP BEING LONGER THAN SOME OF MY SCHOOL ESSAYS

[runningfrom2am]

cold nights // part twenty-seven

summary: you were back in the capitol, and you would be damned if you didn't try your hardest to make it worthwhile.

pairing: coriolanus snow x fem!reader

wc: 3.4k

masterlists / nav / requests

tags/warnings: tribute!reader and mentor!coriolanus, r is very sweet (too kind for this world. literally.), sunshine x grumpy trope kinda, he falls first, violence typical for the source material, depictions of mental illness, also she's is very smart (as she should), district twelve!reader.

a/n: omg we're coming up on the end i could cry :') i finished writing everything and i feel like a shell of a person rn without this fic to plan and write, but i hope you guys are excited! there will be five more parts after this and then the epilogue, which brings me to some really exciting news!!

big news #1: i'm opening oneshot requests for this series!! my normal requests will remain closed but i'd love to see what you guys want for the more of this series! (link is here!)

big news #2: the end of this story is opening the doors to my third coryo series which I've been working on for a hot minute, and it'll be called requiem! (see the original request for it here to get the vibes before i post anything!)

my asks are also open to talk about this series! (i do have emoji anons open now too!)

send me any and all of your thoughts! here!

series masterlist // playlist

The protests caught you off guard, more than anything.

It had only been two weeks since you started your classes and you were loving them, but you hated getting dropped off in the morning and picked up in the afternoon. You and Coryo could no longer eat lunch outside, and the previously full lecture halls you had occupied saw more and more students dropping out as people stood outside just to shout at you as you came and went from the school four days a week. To call you an animal, that you don't belong there, that you should be "put down" for crimes against the Capitol. What they were? You had no idea.

Suffice to say, parents were not happy that you were there.

Generally, Coryo said that people had loved you in the games. You were "harmless", and "sweet", you gave them someone to root for- but now that you were walking freely among them instead of being kept behind the bars at the zoo or trapped inside the arena awaiting your death, you were suddenly a threat.

"They... they think I'll hurt someone?" You sniff, watery eyes overflowing as you look at Coryo lying beside you in his bed.

He bites his tongue, nodding as he wipes away your tears with the hand he has resting just under your cheek on top of his pillow. "They're afraid. That's all, it's not because of anything you did."

"I won't." You cry. "I would never, you know that, right?"

"I know, love. I know that." He promises you quietly.

"I don't want people to be afraid of me. It's not fair to them... If they feel unsafe I should just drop out."

"You're not doing that." He insists with a slight shake of his head. "We'll figure it out. Okay? Don't worry about them."

You just nod softly, wiping your eyes as he pushes his arm under your neck. "C'mere." He mumbles rolling onto his back and you move closer, laying your head on his chest as he pulls you closer to his side.

Coryo did figure it out, for the most part, which is how you ended up standing in Capitol TV's studios, awaiting an interview with Lucky Flickerman, someone you definitely thought you would never see again after the games. You didn't know how Coryo did it, who he had to talk to in order to convince them to let you plead your case so publicly. Apparently, the Snow name came with more power than you knew.

"You're gonna do great, love." Coryo whispers to you. "Just be yourself, but remember what I said about your essay, right? Be honest, but think about how you word things. I know you can do it." He assures you quietly, hands resting on your shoulders.

You nod, giving him a hopeful smile. "Thank you."

"I'll be right here, I'm not going anywhere." These types of reassurances were becoming less and less necessary over the month you've been here, but still, you don't like it when he's far, and he doesn't like it when he doesn't know where you are. It worked nicely for you both.

"Miss Y/L/N, whenever you're ready." One of the crew directs you, pointing to the comfortable chair they had set up in front of a homey-looking backdrop. It was fake, but it was meant to look like you were in someone's house. The idea of it was confusing to you, but you supposed it was also unimportant. You had much bigger concerns.

"Thank you." You smile at them and give Coryo another quick nod before making your way over to the seat that they said was yours.

Coryo watches as you carefully brush your hands over the front of your dress, smoothing it as you sit down. You looked so elegant as you did it, if he didn't know better, it looked like the habits of the people you were now surrounded with were rubbing off on you quickly. He had watched you rehearse how you would carry yourself and how you would speak and act with Tigris just this morning, after she fit you into the dress she had made for the occasion. Clearly, you had been paying attention.

When you draw your hair from your back and over your shoulder so your meticulously styled curls wouldn't be crushed against the chair, Coryo thinks he might need to sit down. Especially so when you look back at him again, subtly waving at him with your hand from where they are placed in your lap. The dress Tigris had given to you was red- a deep red silky material that complimented the red of his coat and mimicked the shade of the Capitol's flag but still had you standing out on your own. Seeing the way that dress fit you and hugged your form in all the right ways even as you were sitting, he was sure he had never been more grateful to his cousin and her talents.

"Y/N, it's so good to see you again." Lucky smiles at you as he sits down across from you, adjusting the small device attached to his lapel as crew members come up to you and fasten the same thing to the front and back of your dress.

"You as well." You grin, trying the best you can to mask your nervousness.

"Are you ready? Do you need anything?" He asks and you shake your head.

"I am ready whenever you are." You confirm, looking around as some more lights flick on, bright in your eyes as the man behind the camera starts counting down.

You look over at Coryo one last time and he nods at you. It was just like your first interview all over again- you had to sell yourself to the people. To prove that you were worth trusting.

"My name is Lucretius "Lucky" Flickerman," You smile as he flips a coin up into the air. You've seen him do it before, but you still weren't sure how the trick worked. "Amateur magician and your host for everything interesting on Capitol TV, and today is certainly no exception. Today, I have a familiar face with me who I know you will all recognize as well, the Victor of the Tenth Annual Hunger Games, Miss Y/N Y/L/N." He looks over at you and you keep your eyes on him, certain that all cameras are watching you now.

"Y/N, I am so happy to have you back. How have you been?" Lucky asks you and you're already fighting off the need to fidget with your hands.

"I am very well." You smile at him. "How about yourself? It has been a while."

"I'm great, thank you! You know, I was not allowed to bet on the games, but anyone who was there can tell you that I predicted your win from the beginning. You certainly are something else."

"Oh, well thank you." You giggle. "Though, I can't fully be credited for my win. I have to thank the sponsors who allowed Coriolanus to send me food and water. That made all the difference in my game."

"Oh, most definitely." He agrees. "But you shouldn't deny your own role in that. Hiding in the vents, that was genius!" Lucky claps. "Truly, that was a jaw-dropping moment for all of us watching. I remember thinking 'wow, how did she think of that?' It was incredible!"

"Yes, well, I saw the grate and knew it was worth a try." You shrug, slightly laughing. "I had nothing to lose."

"Yes, well, I'm dying to know- what have you been up to the last few months? You went back to Twelve, and then what?"

"Oh! Yes, I did. I've been spending time with friends and family, I got a job at the local library, catching up on some reading, that sort of thing." You grin, glancing at Coryo for only a moment and he gestures for you to continue. "I got home and I really realized for the first time how much we should be appreciating everything we have- even out in the Districts where sometimes life is tough, it's key to remember how privileged we are to be alive. The games were truly eye-opening for me."

Coryo gives you a quick nod of approval, and you smile, training your view back on the man across from you.

"Yes, I agree. Live life to the fullest, that's what they say." You just nod at his response. "Which also begs the question, if you were happy back in Twelve, what brought you back to the Capitol?"

Let the lies begin.

"Well," You laugh nervously. "When I was given the opportunity to come here for the games back in July, I was so interested in everything. The people who I got to talk to, the things I got to see, it was all amazing and I was just dying for more."

"So you decided to come study at the university here, is what I've heard."

"Yes, exactly." You grin. "I just think that the Capitol has so much to offer as far as education goes, I am already learning so much and I am having so much fun doing it."

"So really, your focus is just on your education." He prompts you and you nod.

"Definitely, considering the course load I don't have time for much else, but that doesn't really bother me. Like I said, I just want to learn from the greatest minds in the nation. Even the other students, it's amazing! Everyone has earned their spot there and I can see why and all the work they have put in to be there. It's a privilege to study among them, and I am so grateful that I was given this chance."

"You say 'all the work that they put in to be there', but you didn't attend the academy, so how is it that you were admitted?"

"I filled out the same application that all the other students did, I went through all the same testing." You confirm, nodding at him. "Although," You laugh slightly. "I was only given one day to complete it all. I was locked away in my room working on it all night. I hardly had time to blink, it was tough."

"Wow!" Lucky laughs. "One day? I remember when I applied to the university, my application took months to get just right. You must have aced it all."

"I am very proud of the work I did to be admitted, yes." You smile.

"From what I hear, you should be." He agrees. "So, you're really not in it for the sake of making friends."

"Well, I certainly would love to, but it is not my priority." You nod. "But, if any of my classmates are watching, I promise I am good at proofreading and if you need a second set of eyes on your papers, I'm happy to help. I'd also love to have more people to discuss our readings with." You joke, looking into the camera for the first time.

Lucky laughs. "You've heard it here, everyone. Y/N's pitch to make some friends!"

"Yes, I suppose it was." You chuckle, smiling at him.

"Now on the topic of friends while we're getting to know you better," You tilt your head at him while he begins the question, unsure where it is going. "Back home, do you have a boyfriend? Surely he must be missing you."

"No, not at home..." You laugh, catching in the corner of your eye as Coryo shakes his head at you, his face flat of emotion. "I don't have a boyfriend. Again, that's really just not where my priorities lie at the moment. I've... I've had a very busy year, you could say." You explain hesitantly.

"Wow! A beautiful girl like you?" You laugh nervously at his response. "Capitol boys! She's smart, pretty, and single. Just saying." He says, raising his hands.

You knew his job today was to help you, to make you more likable and more normal, to humanize you, but it was still uncomfortable to hear. "Oh, please." You laugh nervously, waving a hand at him. "Like I said, I'm just here to learn. I'm not after anyone's son."

"No? Not even all the handsome boys in your classes? I'm sure there are at least a few." He teases you and your cheeks flush red.

"I wouldn't know, I'm watching the lectures." You shrug jokingly.

Coryo is trying not to lose his mind while you talk about how single you are. Not that you were much of a willing participant, and to be fair he did tell you not to indicate to them that the two of you were together. You technically weren't, if he was being totally fair, but just because it hadn't been said doesn't mean it isn't real. He knew you knew that, though. So why was he getting so mad?

He doesn't even realize how little attention he was paying after that until you're standing up and shaking Lucky's hand. It was over, you'd done everything you could have to ease the minds of scared and angry Capitol parents.

Lucky gives you a quick hug, wishing you good luck in your classes before you're allowed to rejoin Coryo. "Ready to go?" He asks and you nod.

"How did I do?" You ask as you walk out of the studio and into the hall, aiming for the elevator to take you back to ground level.

"Amazing, love. You were perfect." Coryo confirms, still noticeably tense as he walks next to you.

"Are you sure?" You ask as he presses the button to call the car up to your level, unsure since he still hasn't really looked at you.

The door opens and you both step in. "Yes." He tells you again, quickly tapping the door close button.

"Oh, good. I was really nervous..." You laugh slightly as the doors slide shut, and as soon as any light from the hall ceases to enter the elevator his hands are on you and his lips are pressed against yours.

You let out the slightest squeak out of shock, but quickly relax as Coryo rubs familiar small circles on your hips with his thumbs. How he could be so gentle as he backs you into the wall of the elevator you don't know, but you're grateful for it as you hum into his mouth. But still, something was different.

Spending so much time with you only made him want you more. He loved you, he knew that, and someplace deep in the corners of his mind, he had always wanted you in a way he never thought possible when he first fell for you before the games. Now, with you curled up under his sheets almost every night, seeing you step out of the bathroom with damp hair after a shower in pyjamas that don't fit you quite right, he thought about it more than ever. Thoughts of you plagued him more than usual, and the best way to describe the accompanying feeling was guilt. Guilt that he couldn't show you off given the circumstances- at least not yet.

He trails his kisses away from your lips and across your jaw, pulling you tighter against him. "You're so beautiful, my love..." He mumbles into the skin just below your ear, leaving a kiss in his wake that has your head spinning.

You giggle, eyes fluttering open. "What has gotten into you?" You ask, hands sliding up over his chest to rest on his shoulders.

"I can't tell my girlfriend that I think she's gorgeous?" He asks, shaking his head slightly as he looks down into your eyes.

"Oh, so I am your girlfriend." You giggle and he nods, kissing you again.

"Of course you are, and don't forget it." He chuckles, pulling back from you as the elevator stops moving, waiting for the doors to open.

Your skin is flushed down to your chest as the doors slide apart and even though he's not touching you anymore, you can feel the ghost of his hands on you. You look up at him, a lingering smirk still on his face as he looks straight ahead and leads you out of the car.

The phone rang at the time you were eating dinner, and you quickly asked if you could be excused to go answer it. Coryo and Tigris both just nodded at you, but you could still feel their grandmother's eyes burning into your back as you quickly walked away. She still wasn't fond of you, but she tolerated you. For now, that was just enough.

You grab the phone off the receiver as the small round screen flickers to life. "Hello?" You answer, hopeful that it would finally be your family you see on the other side.

You had answered every call that came to the Snow's apartment for weeks, waiting anxiously to hear their voices again.

"Y/N, is that you, honey?"

You gasp with excitement when you get a clear enough view of your ma. "Ma! Hi!" You smile, leaning in a little closer to get a more clear view as the camera on their end begins to adjust. This was likely the first time it was being used.

"Oh, honey, how good it is to see you!" She smiles, and out of nowhere, you feel hot tears welling up in your eyes.

"You too, Ma." You nod, biting into your lower lip. You didn't want to cry so quickly into the call. "How are you? How's everything at home?"

"Same old." She shakes her head with a slight laugh. "I'm much more interested in you- how is everything? How is school? And how is Tybalt settling in? How are you settling in? My goodness, I just have so many questions!"

You laugh, quickly wiping a stray tear. You had told them about all of this in letters, of course, but she just wanted to hear you say it all. "Everything is good. School has been so lovely, Coryo walks me to all my classes and we eat lunch together between. And Tybalt just loves it here! They have a garden on the roof, and I take him up there as often as I can. Tigris won't stop giving him treats either so he couldn't be happier."

You look down at the animal as he brushes against your leg, looking up at you.

"That's amazing. I've been so worried, it's just so good to see your face again. God, we've been missin' you..."

"I miss you too." You agree, careful not to choke on your tears. "How is Len? And have you seen Lucy Gray and the Covey?"

"He's... He's doing alright." Your mother looks off-screen, and you assume he must be there. The look on her face, one of nervousness and hesitation tells you he doesn't want to speak to you. "But Lucy Gray has been around every day, she and Maude Ivory come over and they help me with hanging the laundry and such... It's been good to have them around."

You smile sadly, nodding slightly with the receiver pressed to your ear. You felt bad about that aspect of leaving- you spent as much time as you could before the games helping out around the house, but even in the summer when you came back you weren't much help. Your mother wouldn't let you do dishes all summer, for fear that the sight of a knife might set you off. She knew you came back a different person, and she wasn't taking any risks. All she really allowed you to do was hang laundry and "keep her company" while she did other home chores. But now, she didn't even have that.

"Can I speak to him?" You ask, referring to your brother who you knew was there.

She nods, waving off camera and holding her hand over the wrong part of the phone. "Lennox, come over here. Y/N wants to talk to you."

His response is muffled, but you make out the gist of it. 'I don't want to talk to her'.

"She's your sister, Lennox. You can't ignore her forever."

'If she wants to talk, she should come home.'

Your heart clenches in your chest and you chew your lip. You have to pretend you couldn't hear, but you just felt so horribly guilty. You shouldn't have left, but he doesn't understand you had no choice. He wouldn't be able to understand until you could come home and see him again, likely not until the summer. Coryo had told you to be mindful of what you write in letters and what you say on the phone, it's possible others were listening. The Capitol was always listening.

"He's just a little busy right now, honey." She smiles at you, but you can see right through it. "But tell me about your day! Did you have class?"

taglist: @soulessjourney , @that-veela-girl ,  @dreamyysouls, @rockstarbfs, @maysileeewrites , @baybieruth , @kitscutie,  @fratboyharrysgf0201 , @totallynotkaibiased , @stelleduarte , @secretsicanthideanymore , @bejeweledreverie , @drewsandsebastianswife , @niicole-87 , @queenofshinigamis , @innercreationflower , @nallasstuff , @iovemoonyy , @thatmarvelchick19 , @wearemadeofstardust0 , @regulusblackcore , @puredreamagination , @fantasticchaosthing , @becauseseaotters , @secretsicanthideanymore , @strawberryflavouredkisses, @cascadingbliss

okay suddenly tumblr isn't letting me tag more people than this so i just made some cuts unfortunately :') i just left the max amount of people i could whose users i recognized and see in my notifs all the time :) if you're not on here and you should be i'm so sorry!

also this taglist is closed now!! if you’d like to get a notification when i update, turn on my post notifications!! i promise i won’t spam y'all :,)

#tbosas #tbosas fanfiction #tbosas fic #tbosas x reader #the ballad of songbirds and snakes #thg #thg fanfic #thg fic #thg series #thg fanfiction #the hunger games #coriolanus snow #coriolanus snow x reader #coriolanus x reader #coriolanus fanfiction #coriolanus imagine #coriolanus x you #coryo snow #coryo x reader #coryo x you #snow lands on top #snow x reader

[kell-eramis]

🔥talk some mad shit on taao

OOOH ok this is gonna take a while and i'm writing this in many places--on campus, after school, on the bus, so forgive me if anything doesn't make sense.

Topics: windblade, starscream, elita, combaticons, combiners, and bumblebee

Windblade:

Disclaimer, I *love* Windblade and I love what she represents (and this could be it’s own mini essay).

However, I don’t think M Scott had those ideas particularly in mind when writing Windblade. Retroactively knowing she intended Windblade and Starscream to have a r*ylo dynamic, paints both of them and their dynamic in a completely different light: Windblade is now no longer her own character, but a tool to redeem Starscream, and becomes a “blank slate or self insert” for this dynamic and purpose. As a result, she’s not really given the opportunity to grow from flaws, and she’s not really punished for mistakes (it’s moreso Starscream paying for her choice to have Optimus Prime reveal himself as the “true Prime” to Caminus, and this is almost always framed as Optimus being in the good and Starscream being in the wrong), it’s moreso that we’re told that Windblade is “tempted by Starscream’s ways/by power, but triumphs over this because she is Good, and is able to redeem Starscream in the process.” We also see others taking the fall for her mistakes, as Chromia takes the fall for the cover up—there is no repercussions on Windblade’s part in terms of trust of Cybertron. (This also serves to take Chromia out of the picture and focus on Windblade and Starscream over any potential chromeblade narratives that could (and did) arise).

I think if I were to fix this, I would look at how the war that affects everyone on Cybertron also affects her, one of the first Camien immigrants. Like… living in this new environment that is *so* traumatized, and you, yourself are traumatized too but in a completely different way. (And this is especially obvious in the first Windblade run, with both her and Chromia’s arcs.) Not the idea that Starscream/Cybertronian politics “corrupts” Windblade, but the idea that living in this environment that has barely started to heal will inevitably rub off on her—in both good and bad ways. And she, being someone on the outside coming in, can see how the factions are flawed and how everyone needs to come together to make Cybertron more of a home than it has ever been. I don’t know if I worded this completely right, but I hope I’m getting my point across.

Starscream:

OOOOH. I could go on and on for days on end. I think the way M Scott handled Starscream’s dysphoria is very transphobic and concluded in a way that’s like “if I were not dysphoric, I would not be evil.” That’s… not what dysphoria does. Starscream would be Starscream no matter if he were cold constructed or forged—maybe just with different problems. Nurture over nature and all that. Another problem I have is due to the established windblade and starscream dynamic, starscream is often portrayed as evil—often to the point of irrationality. While Starscream might not be the best leader, she’s smarter than sending badgeless after random cons and inciting further violence as a result. We get a lot of “tell and doesn’t show” with Starscream’s tactics (and Onslaught’s, as well), and while it would make sense for Starscream to be paranoid (hence the distrust of Windblade) and to try to prepare for a second coming of the war (even if she doesn’t realize that’s what he’s doing by amassing combiner and titan power), some of the actions Starscream takes are outright irrationally evil, just to put that dichotomy between her and Windblade and incite the redemption. Other characters become tools either to show how evil Starscream is (the Combaticons, Rattrap, etc) or to redeem Starscream (Windblade, Bumblebee). I could go on and on about this but I will end it here (for now).

Elita-One:

Again, a case of “tell and don’t show”. We’re told that she’s “another Megatron” but there’s nothing to back that up—why is she another Megatron? What has she done to imply that? She’s traumatized from being hypervigilant over being the one in charge of Carcer (wherein Vigilem and Liege Maximo are incarcerated), and that shows in how she interacts with Cybertron. I don’t think she’d be a good leader for Cybertron—for the same reason neither Bumblebee nor Starscream (nor Optimus or Megatron) could be the right leader for Cybertron. They’re too stuck in the war, though it is possible to move on from it with time and effort. I do think, however, that she’s not this grand villain that M Scott paints her out to be. God forbid women do anything.

The Combaticons:

I could also talk at length about them for days. I think that they have the issue of becoming a tool to show how evil Starscream is, rather than their own characters with their own arcs. Which is a shame, as I think all of their individual arcs and as a whole gestalt could be *so* interesting.

With Blast Off and Onslaught:

We see Onslaught being extremely stuck in the war--he *wants* it to come back because he *wants* that purpose--what does a tactician do when there's no battles to be a tactician for? And Blast Off, who loves Onslaught (and his group), wants peace. Wants rest. Wants that peace and rest for Onslaught most of all. TAAO contextualizes what Blast Off does as a *selfish* thing—he does what he does because he wants that relationship. But that’s *not* what it is. She does what she does because she wants to see Onslaught heal from the war. He (as well as Starscream) knows this can’t happen unless Onslaught is given something new to obsess over—without that something, he’ll go back to the war and vengeance. So Blast Off, in a way, offers herself to be that. This isn’t selfish, in my opinion, because he knows that the relationship is doomed if she does that. Onslaught will find out, and when that happens, any possibility of a relationship will cease to be. It’s a sacrifice Blast Off makes to save Onslaught and the other Combaticons.

Brawl:

Now, I love the part where Brawl goes to Windblade and says he can’t have the war come back. He goes behind Onslaught’s and Starscream’s backs to do so. However, I wish this transition was shown more. He willingly chose to go with Galvatron and continue the war. He’s with Onslaught and Vortex when they want to make Cybertron burn. What changes? He says it’s “feeling what it’s like to die”, but beyond a few moments in Issue #4 and the annual, we don’t *see* this. No feelings of uncertainty at post war or relief when it comes to just staying Starscream’s bodyguard, just a comic relief along with Vortex.

Vortex:

Which brings me to Vortex. He’s reduced to a comic relief character. However, we know he’s an interrogator. I think we should have seen him interrogating bots for information on Swindle, searching it out. And then I think we should have also seen the ramifications of such a violent combination on him, too. (Though that could be said about all the Combaticons).

Swindle:

And that brings me to Swindle. I think Swindle, (and I also think Bumblebee should, too, but that’s a different argument) should be more present in the narrative even when she’s dead. While this is arguably present in the first arc, she’s moreso used as a catalyst for Onslaught’s grudge with Starscream turning into something more, but I think he’s used moreso as an excuse for why Onslaught’s doing all this more than an actual reason. Then Swindle is brought back in an *incredibly* traumatic and violent way. What does this mean for how she feels about the new Cybertron? How the gestalt and combination intimately affects her in ways it doesn’t affect the others? How this —frankly, violation— of her mind and memories for Onslaught’s purposes affects her and his relationship with the other Combaticons? Ooooh the things I wish TAAO went more in depth about. Then, there’s also the fact that he had helped Windblade. How does this affect the relationship between them, especially now that Chromia’s gone? How does this affect Swindle’s relationship with Blurr???

Combiners in general:

This is a problem I have with phase 2 in general, but I wish combiners were used more. They’re A Thing now that the enigma of combination is a prominent artifact. But they’re only really seen as temporary threats. We don’t go into the reason why Starscream wants one, and when that reason fulfills itself, they’re NOT used. We could have used combiners in Titan’s Return, for example!!!

I also think that IDW writers in general don’t really know what they might symbolize. Are they abject? Are they holy? Unholy? A monstrosity or a beauty?

If I was writing a continuity, I would look at combiners as the closest one could go to “being one in the allspark” without being dead. I could go into Augustinian philosophy and theology here, but I won’t (for now). However, they change the members of the gestalt in irreversible and abject ways! They blend together with the other members—they are no longer inherently individual. They are bound to each other.

Bumblebee:

Same as Swindle, really. I wish he was more present in the narrative as haunting it. Their death is the catalyst for many things and adds to others. However, M Scott only really uses Bumblebee as a passive advisor for Starscream. I think TAAO and starbee could be a significantly more impactful narrative if Bumblebee’s ideology and perceptions of things such as factions and power also moved in a way that was more towards Starscream’s perspective, rather than just Starscream becoming more “good”. It would also give us a chance to actually highlight the flaws of the autobot faction without being like “optimus is shitty, prowl is shitty, the primes were shitty, insert cartoonishly evil villains that happen to also be autobots to show how flawed they are”.

Okay, I’m finished. This was not at all all of my opinions and ideas but with a topic as broad as all of TAAO, how could I choose?

#pls feel free to ask me to elaborate or ask more questions or whatever #i literally love literary analysis and putting the stuff I’m learning in my degree into transformers #combaticon

[geminigengar]

Eddie with a reader who was labeled a “loser” but slowly works her way in with the popular vicious girl group, and sees shes slowly changing her looks but also her dialogue. Kinda like Cady from Mean Girls?

Mean Girl

eddie munson x popular!reader

you and eddie fell out of touch a long time ago. it's not until you're grouped together for a history assignment he realises he may hate what you've become but that doesn't mean you ever stopped looking out for him.

warnings: misunderstandings, mild angst, fluff, happy ending, & stupid long bit about a history assignment

A/N: anon, ur galaxy brain fr i LOVE this concept. the mean girls are my shit. & sorry it took so long this is my first request ever (ty!✨) so i wanted it to be perfect🙏🏽. it's a bit short but this is actually the middle of a much longer plot i wrote out but knew it'd take forever and wanted to get this posted sooner. i still have it in the drafts if you like this story just lmk! • and as always reader is bipoc-coded

you starred at him dumbfounded and a little offended. "nuh-huh."

you starred at him dumbfounded and a little offended. "nuh-huh."

you starred at him dumbfounded and a little offended. "nuh-huh."

"yeah-huh."

you snatched them once again, taking a brief glance before shoving them in your backpack. "nope! looks fun but i don't know shit about d&d." you stood, linking your arm with his as you picked up a second bag from the floor. "and we're up first, sunshine."

eddie was seething, frown seemingly stuck gracing his features as you settled at the front of the classroom. this was one of the few times he put any effore into an assignment; probably more than was necessary. he knew you had great grades and as much as he claimed to hate you he couldn't be the reason you got a failing grade, researching one of the few things he knew enough to write about. but apparently all that was for nothing.

it had been years since you'd spoken to eachother. sure, it was his fault you'd drifted apart. he'd blamed your newfound popularity in middle school for the wedge between you, at least that's what he'd told himself. no, he'd never admit he had been and still was jealous. of you and your ability to make meshing in with the it kids at school look so easy or others your attenion was now split with he wasn't sure.

eddie went to speak but you shushed him as you swat his chest with your hand still around his bicep. he played off the lingering chill left behind in his skin as you detached from him with a scoff. you slapped the hefty pink bag into his arms as you out your essay from it, "hold this."

before he could cuss you out your teacher called the class to attention. you grinned as he asked you both what your project was on.

you couldn't keep the smirk off your face as you answered. "our project is on the history and influence of metal music."

eddie's head whipped down to stare at you, a flip of hair over your shoulder being the only acknowledgment of the questions you could feel in his stare.

you heard a sigh from your teacher, "Y/N did you participate in this project at all?"

"duh," you scoffed "obviously i wrote it down. his handwriting is shit," you added, waving the stapled papers for emphasis.

he rolled his eyes, taking the assignment from you, but waved you to continue on nontheless.

clearing your throat you began clearly, having perfected your public speaking to keep all eyes on you years prior. your body language, well placed smiles, and velvet voice were captivating.

even after all these years eddie still knew you inside and out. he wondered how often you had to pretend not to be yourself around others to make your performance of ease so convincing.

"nowadays," you began. "the creation of metal music is debatable. some historians say it can solely be credited to black sabbath," on your tiptoes, you dug in the bag eddie held. you pulled out a vinyl record. "with the creation of their self titled album released in february of 1970."

eddie starred at it wide eyed as you held the record up for the class. the same he had given you for your birthday one year when you were kids. it still had the wear and tear from you both as you had played the album over and over, day after day until the record sleeve was torn and frayed. neither of you had a care in the world back then- only each other. for him there had only been you.

"others however, say it can be credited to what's been dubbed the 'unholy trinity.'" you said, taking out two more records. "the unholy trinity consisted of, along with black sabbath, led zepplin and deep purple. whatever the case may be, clearly black sabbath had a heavy influence in the creation of heavy metal."

eddie snorted as you continued. posture perfect and voice even even when cracking lame jokes. you went over the beginnings of rock music, how it laid the foundation for metal. explained the metal's rise in popularity and record sales. he was surprised you even mentioned the rise in false accusations of occultism in those associated with the genre; causing half the class to stare at him.

you'd pulled out albums, tapes, and posters; all of them worn. eddie remembered most of them from when you were kids. he registered some were newer, meaning you were still keeping up with them. he assumed you'd given up metal entirely. he figured you and the other cheerleaders listened to whatever top 40 bullshit was put out that week. the realisation that you clearly still loved the genre made him feel warm inside for reasons he couldn't figure out and din't think he wanted to know

he listened intently as you went over the importance of every album, interjecting his thoughts every now and then that you were grateful for. his favourite album of yours being the agents of fortune album tape by blue öyster cult that you proudly admitted to the class was the first item you ever shoplifted, to your teachers chargrin.

you finished up your speech by dumping all the albums into the bag eddie still held, earning an 'oof' from the metalhead.

as the next presenters took your places, you both returned to your seats.

to be completely honest you were nervous. you were nervous. you, one of the most carefree people to ever walk the halls of hawkins high; never caring what anyone thought, never embarrassed by anyone or anything. but this was different. you could care less about some brain dead jock and whatever few thoughts he was capable of concerning you but this wasn't just anyone, this was eddie. sure he was still your eddie, at least to you, but you knew you had both changed. what if he thought you were a loser, desperate to impress him? or worse- a poseur.

you had mastered your poker face a long time ago. you worked at your nails with a nail file you had pulled from your backpack; face neutral as if you hadn't a care in the world. you could only keep it up so long as you felt eddie's stare on you. he never was very good at subtly.

the second the bell rang you were out of your seat on the way to your car despite it only being the middle of the school day.

eddie didn't follow you or come after you which had you both relieved and disappointed. you dropped both bags onto the passenger seat. releasing a shaky breath, you felt your façade crumble. popping one of the tapes in and blasting the speakers. you peeled out of the parking lot.

•

later that night there estood eddie, in the middle of your room having climbed in your window. why you had opened it you didn't know. you should've kept it locked, told him to take his sorry ass home but you didn't. even after all these years of the cold shoulder and jabs and insults from him and hell raisers club you knew you'd always open the door if he knocked.

you were visibly upset, mostly confused, hoping he wasn't here to yell at you about his d&d essay. "why are you here, munson?"

eddie winced. he'd been called by his last name tons in his life. various tones and emotions behind it every time, but never from you. not like this. you couldn't help it, you were'nt mad just scared. he'd never explicitly said you weren't friends anymore or that he hated you but you didn't want to here him say now exactly that.

he struggled to find the words, cradling his backpack as his mouth opened and closed.

you rolled your eyes, already tired from having been woken up abruptly to the rocks hitting your window. reaching in to pull out your popular facade, the one never affected by anynes words spoke for you, "i dunno what you want eddie but just go-."

he stopped you in your tracks, begging him to wait. he took your raised eyebrow as momentary acceptance. he sat on the edge in your bed as he opened his backpack taking out a book and a d&d game box.

you didn't speak, waiting for him to wade through whatever storm was raging in him brain. he finally bit his lip, letting out a quiet "lemme show you?"

you stilled, entirely confused as to why eddie munson had crawled into your bedroom in the middle of the night just to ask you to play dungeond and dragons with him. your confusion must've shown on your face - that or eddie still knew how to read you better than you could yourself, as he answered your unasked question. "in class earlier you said it looked fun. i can show you, if you want?"

this was far cry from the conversation you knew you should, but the blush on his cheeks and with his eyes boring into yours, desperate and longing, you caved.

you rolled your eyes again as you made your way to the head of the bed leaning against the pile of pillows placed there as youtook off your bonnet bonnet to set on your nightstand. you pat the spot next to you, beckoning him closer. "start with the basics."

he grinned, relaxing now that he was forgiven for the tim ebeing, and scrambled to take his place by your side. a place he'd missed and wanted to be again, as long as you'll have him.

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x black!reader #eddie munson x poc!reader #eddie munson x popular!reader #stranger things x reader #eddie munson imagines #stranger things imagines #anon post #gengar request tag #request tag

[truetgirl]

Another day, another self-indulgent mini-essay for pride! Today our subject is:

Nicolina (AKA Nico Minoru and Karolina Dean from the Runaways comics)!

Another pick that will come as precisely zero surprise to anyone who has heard me talk about my favorite fictional characters and stories for longer than like 2 seconds. Back in the first pride post series I did I actually discussed each of them as individual characters, and I believe I book-ended the month with them, if memory serves.

What makes these two worth it is the joy of seeing that slow, sometimes painful, but always worthwhile journey of self discovery. Over the course of fifteen years (between they first debuted and when they finally got together) of real-world time, two or three years their time, they grew together, lived together, fought and bled together, and all the while they loved each other. But not always romantically. Well, at least not for Nico.

See, Karolina knew she liked girls from the start. Moreover, she knew she liked Nico right from the start.

These are the fourth and fifth panels she appears in. She has had 3 lines before this moment. She ignores Chase coming on to her, rushes over to Nico the moment she sees her, and starts awkwardly stealth-flirting. This incredibly clear setup for her crush on Nico is like the second thing we ever learn about her, after her name. I wish to take this moment to remind you that this was published in 2003.

Now, this being a comic book, some shit goes down that pretty well back-burners the implied gay crush. Not the least of these was Nico and Alex’s budding relationship at the time. Karolina’s journey of understanding and accepting her sexuality is still going on, but we’re left with an obscured, narrow view of it for a while. The most we got is her clearly self-loathing and brief attempt to force herself to like that one kid that turned out to be a vampire. Yeah, that one, the one that she unintentionally killed with sunlight-blood when she tried to let him kill her.

Then came Alex’s big turn when they went to face their parents. A turn that led Nico to declaring that she was done with boys. Karolina’s reaction to which pretty clearly showed us that she was still into this girl.

Cut to 8 issues into the second volume and things have changed a fair bit. Karolina’s still not in the best place mentally, but she’s doing about as fucking well as could be expected of a teenage girl who was recently suicidal and then had to fight her supervillain parents before leaving them for dead along with a turncoat friend. She’s not as timid anymore, she seems to be a little surer and bolder about being gay (doing stuff like chewing out Chase for using gay as an insult), even if she was still closeted.

Nico, for her part, has become a leader in Alex’s stead. It’s a chaotic and fraught dynamic, and she never really fills the role the same clear and authoritative way that Alex eventually had, but these kids would go to pieces without her. And she’s bearing this responsibility, even if it’s only implied, while dealing with all the same tragedy as the rest of them. Hell, probably feeling it even more keenly because of how close she and Alex had been. Part of what’s getting her through her days is her friendship with Karolina, which has gotten very close indeed in the time since the showdown with their parents.

This closeness, Karolina’s budding confidence and absurdness, Nico swearing off boys... It all feels like it should be leading to something, right? “But surely not,” thought I, reading this comic published in 2005 in the school library, “Even now, in the enlightened age of 2013, queer stuff barely happens in popular media. No way this old comic is gonna-”

“Well, I’ll be damned." Also, yeah, Nico thought that last bit was her helping the situation. Girl has a looooooong way to go.

Heartbreak of that scene aside, Karolina almost immediately gets swept up by Xavin and taken out into space (the details of which I still want to see first hand, dammit). She has a lot to deal with, emotionally. Between her parents, Alex, her depression, angst about her sexuality, and now Nico’s rejection and this new alien person to whom she is apparently betrothed? Yeah, she’s got a lot on her plate.

Meanwhile, Nico, in the immediate aftermath of everything that has happened, and now this scene being her seemingly last memory of her best friend, is left crushingly alone. She believes, and honestly has pretty decent grounds to believe, that she just drove Karolina as far away as it is possible to go. She’s isolated, and she can hardly even begin to process how badly she must have just hurt her best friend by reacting so severely.

So she spirals. She becomes self destructive in her personal life, especially her love life. Every relationship she has, of which there were quite a few, blows up in her face because she’s not really emotionally engaging with them. In fact, she’s pushing them away, so terrified she is at the prospect of either hurting anyone or being hurt like that again.

Even once Karolina and Xavin come home, a development at which Nico is clearly overjoyed, nothing is as it once was. She and Karolina have both grown into more complicated people than they were before. For one thing, Karolina and Xavin are still together, and they’ve clearly been through a lot together that, for the first time, Nico can’t even begin to relate to. Where once she and Karolina understood implicitly what the other had been through, having lived it together. Now they both had new experiences the other knew nothing of.

Even still, they fell back into one another. Into needing each other, loving one another, being a safe place for the other to go and a support in times of need:

live Victor reaction in the last one like damn dude you ok there?

For a long time it was just. Like this. When Xavin took Karolina’s place to go and be tried for her parents crimes, it was Nico that she confided in about how badly it messed her up. When Nico needed someone she didn’t have to keep the leadership mask on with, she went to Karolina.

I’ll admit I’m not the best versed in what they got up to while their little family was scattered across the Marvel universe, because I was very upset to see them separated so I didn’t go looking into it. But when they got back together, and when the girls started to get back into their old dynamic, I was hopeful. Not hopeful that this ship would happen, I’d long since given up hope by the time the 2017 run rolled in, what with Karolina being in a relationship and Nico still never having been confirmed to like girls. But I appreciated just seeing them together again. Then this happened:

Can you say reversal? Suddenly, after a couple years of growth, Karolina is completely assured in who she is. She’s doing well for herself, what between college, a girlfriend with whom things seem to be going well, and a much healthier level of self esteem helped along by therapy. Nico, meanwhile, is once again showing the bad habits she developed while trying to cope with her various interpersonal traumas. Once more she’s pushing a personal dynamic to any limit she can find, hoping that this time it’ll go well and not blow up in her face.

Even as the two of them continue to be friends again, there’s an awkwardness between them after this. Their relationship is at its lowest point, I would say, since Karolina first tried to kiss Nico. Nico is her usual brand of hot mess who is nonetheless the natural leader of this fucked up little family, and Karolina, while she is better, is by no means perfect.

In fact, it’s during this time that she and her girlfriend start to drift apart. Karolina is trying to spin too many plates now that her friends are together and part of her life again, and it basically means she never sees her girlfriend, Julie, basically at all these days. Karolina doesn’t want to hurt her, I’d go so far as to call it the last thing she wants, but life’s a real screaming bitch sometimes. It’s honestly a really sad breakup to watch, when the time comes, just because it’s so mundane and real. Julie did nothing wrong, and she was perfectly graceful about the whole thing, and Karolina never wanted to them to grow apart like they did, but they did, and it obviously hurt them both.

But, pain or no pain, life goes on. After a few more comic plot shenanigans and a frank conversation about with Nico about the people they’ve lost and what it’s done to them, then comes the big one: Nico volunteers to go with Karolina to this big formal party she’s attending for charity, a party Julie was originally going to go to with her, and this is where we shift to Nico’s perspective, gained from years of slow, agonizingly hard-won character growth, on certain past events...

I was not kidding about how hard this event and her reaction to Karolina clearly stuck in her mind.

This leads into what is both one of the most salient moments of Nico’s development and characterization as well as a perfect glimpse into their friendship and what it’s meant to them over the years:

They’ve always seen each other. They’ve always known they loved each other. Karolina just realized and interpreted it a lot faster. But that time helped both of them to grow. It helped Karolina accept who she was and learn what it meant to be a partner, be part of someone’s life, and how to love herself enough to forgive herself for the things she could never have controlled. It gave Nico the space and time she dearly needed to process her feelings and her trauma, bumpy and hazardous a road as that has always been for her. And now, finally, they figured it out together. They’ve grown into beautiful, wonderful people together, and their shared experiences mean they understand one another in ways nobody else really can. What makes them compelling is, to cut this incredibly long and rambling story short, growth.

#kelly things #kelly's pride posts #pride month #Nico Minoru #Karolina Dean #nicolina #runaways

[kennieswrld]

bad hair-good hair, long hair-short hair

All my life I've wanted long hair. I've never been shamed into hating my hair length or anything, it just felt like the "prettiest" girls in my classes in elementary school had long, straightened hair. Hair that fell and rested upon their backs and waists, and god did I fucking want some.

There's this run on joke between my mother and I about my desperate need for a ponytail when I started the 3rd grade. My very black family decided to uproot themselves from the peachy state that is Georgia to the rainy depressing state that is Washington state. This caused an unknown issue my parent's didn't consider would happen to me, a culture shock of whiteness (mind you this culture shock is still under effect around 13 years later). I had never seen so many white people before, and I was obsessed with their best and most common hairstyle. The ponytail. With its sleek look and sporty nature, a buck toothed 8 year old Kenji wanted to have that hairy fashion statement atop my head. While on the other side of the story, my mother had no clue how to tell me my curly naps would never be able to just naturally slick down and straight for a simple ponytail. For a few weeks she would put my messy hair up into a puffball, but as soon as I saw her "ponytail" I would cry and cry, repeating how this is NOT the ponytail I was looking for.

I guess it's funny now, but it wasn't then. But it's funny to think how much something as trivial as that spiraled into a sort of self hatred I crafted for myself. I hated my hair for years. I wished it were longer, I wished it had a looser curl pattern and I just wished the hair on my head wouldn't be my own. My mother never allowed me to dye or relax my hair while living under her roof which made the entire hair hatred problem even worse as there was no way to escape the hate other than obtaining heat damage for a couple of years in middle school.

But as soon as I got into highschool, something changed. Seeing the same sleek and sporty ponytails whipping side to side as they ran to class just became boring. I had seen it so many times that even if I were to join the club, I would be one of the millions of members. Also during this time I began experimenting with my own hair. Creating different hairstyles for myself via braiding or funky up-do's with all my natural hair. And it was the first time in my entire life that I had ever felt so comfortable in my own skin. Being able to wear my big kinky afro amongst the sea of ponytails finally felt as normal as wearing a ponytail myself.

But after a while. I felt off. My hair was finally exactly where I wanted it to be. I had just grown into loving my hair for who she is instead of trying to make her someone else, until I realized how I was allowing my hair to dictate how other's felt about me. Everything was for others and not me. The validation I felt over the afro I wore wasn't about it being in its afro state, it was over it being the biggest afro. If I wore braids they had to be in for more months of the year than my natural hair could be out. So after some feeling of inadequacies over my hair, I watched video essay after video essay where I listened to multiple black women explain how shrinkage is beautiful, having long hair that hits your butt is not the end all be all and to just be happy with you. So I shaved all my hair off.

Since shaving my head, I have been constantly thinking about that little girl who wanted a ponytail. Now she really cant get a ponytail, and I think she likes it better this way.

#black womanhood #black hair #curly hair #black girl magic #diary entry #journal #just girly thoughts

[rileys-archive]

diaspora is survival : let the dystopian morning light pour in

this is an edited version of an autobiographical essay i submitted for my pan-african geography class where the prompt was

"Using the excerpt from Stokely Carmichael’s Ready for the Revolution as a model, write a short autobiographical essay describing your own experience of “diaspora as survival.” How, in other words, did you end up here in Vancouver and at UBC? While you should describe as much as possible the migrations of your own family, you should also try to include references to those important historical markers of labor, history, race, colonialism, migration, and gender that are referenced by Carmichael." the purpose of me publishing this essay on tumblr is so i can cite it for another class, michael if ur reading this i hope u enjoy it !! i omitted some details i wasn't comfortable posting on the internet (aka not doxxing myself). also if the capitalization seems funky, it's intentional !!

I am what time, circumstance, history, have made of me, certainly, but I am, also, much more than that. So are we all.

[Notes of a Native Son – James Baldwin]

I’ve always been a bit of historian, how could I not when my own history, my own stories, have been hidden from me. To be Indigenous in a country that treats my people as a history, as no longer present, means being a historian of my own culture is a form of resistance. It doesn’t fit with the settler colonial canadian logic for my people to have a history or culture. Everyday I resist this occupation by remembering, by recreating, and continuing anishinaabek ways of living. And if Audre Lorde says, “the personal is political”, then much of what I write (both for academic purposes but also creative projects) will involve the politics of being a disabled Afro-Indigenous queer/two-spirit person living in an occupied state. Simply put, I write as a Nakawe, a citizen of Tootinaowaziibeeng, in Musqueam territory. I write from the belly of the beast and it can hard to avoid the drops of acid on these pages. 

How do you know your history? I’m not saying “ask your mom to cite her sources” but how do you know if what you’ve been told about yourself, your family, community, etc is true? I don’t believe one’s truth and what is fact are the same, at least I haven’t lived a life like that. Thus I’ll start where life starts, with the one who brought me into this world. I was born in oskana kâ-asastêki to my two adoptive parents and my biological mother tracy-lynn. I was adopted at birth, many who aren't familiar with the foster care system (the modern way canada monitors Indigenous children’s whereabouts, since the final residential school closed in 1996) would think that being adopted at birth was a good thing, I don't know if it was. You're likely wondering where my biological dad is… well that makes two of us. During conversations with her social worker she admitted to not knowing the father and regularly having casual sex with men of different ethnic origins, naming white, Indigenous, Black, and Filipino. Thus my adoptive parents (Tracey and Arlon), assumed I was Filipino based on my looks. Although strangers did occasionally throw Black microaggressions towards me, older white women wanted to touch my black curls and I was a girl who wanted to be ‘polite’. 

For the first 18 years of my life, it was my truth that I was Filipino. The guilt of my lack of connection from my Filipino friends eventually brought me to study the language as a teenager. Wanting to know what region of the Philippines my father was from lead me to doing a DNA test around age 18. Discovering the truth, for a short period of time, resulted in a what felt like a cultural crisis. I finally felt comfortable in one of my ethnic backgrounds (comfortable enough to get a tattoo of the Philippines flag within a knife, image above) so realizing the rarity of situations like this and not being able to find help online terrified me. After learning basic Tagalog, growing up with Filipino friends, and even embarking on a double major of History and Asian Studies, I had found myself in a very strange circumstance. You can find thousands of articles giving advice on how to come out as gay or transgender (as I had done so at 11 and 12 myself), but nobody really comes out as African. Honestly, I was scared that people would think of me as a liar or fraud. Like the pretendian equivalent of being Black. If the truth came to light, people would think I was intentionally lying about my race. At the same time, I was scared that if I said I was Black, but provided no proof, I was just some annoying leftist trying to claim a marginalized identity. It felt like being called to fight in a war where I'd lose on either front. 

As strange as it sounds, I can’t imagine my life without my queerness. Growing up with two older siblings that came out as queer before me allowed 11 year old me to develop language to understand myself and others. If I weren’t queer, I don’t know if I would’ve been introduced to philosophies of identity and history. Gaining a sense of self, a sense of pride in who I am and the communities I’m a part of, was integral to me discovering feminism at a young age (roughly age 13), leading me to learn from Black and Indigenous feminists/communists, many of whom I cite today in teacher education. The most important life lesson being queer has given me is that I don’t need to “know” myself, know what exact labels and identities suit me at any given moment, I just need to live. For example, I don’t inject testosterone because I feel at my core I’m a man (I don’t) or because I feel a need to prove my masculinity in a biological way (I don’t), I do it because I like the way it makes my body look. In a very Gen Z way, I decided to fuck around and find out. Thus when I had my cultural identity crisis, I realized I could just identify as mixed Black/Ethiopian/African. In the same way there’s no “true trans” person, there’s was no way for me to “truly” be African. I just am. 

As mentioned, I learnt about social justice issues and movements relatively early which was integral to my own identity development. Through learning from revolutionaries like Kwame Ture who stated “​​We're Africans in America, struggling against American capitalism. We're not Americans” and “a fight for power is a fight for land. [...] Our land is Africa. America's not our land, it belongs to the American Indians and we have a right to stand and take a moral struggle with them.” I felt empowered to describe myself as Afro-Indigenous, to bring my two sides together as one whole. Diaspora is survival can mean a lot of things at different times & places but here, it meant a member of the diaspora empowered another diaspora to take up the family name of African, within my mixed background. The name survived its travels. This is my favourite term for a few important reasons. Firstly, I’m acknowledging the lands I’m from. Both the ties I have to Africa as a diaspora and Indigenous reflecting my Turtle Island upbringing. Secondly, I’m not identifying with a colonial state as terms like Indigenous Canadian or Black Canadian would suggest. Lastly, I’m not playing into the settler idea of blood quantum. A soul cannot be divided into percentages.

It feels wrong, embarrassing even, to say I envy the classmates of mine who have the privilege of being one call or text away from a family member that can answer simple questions. I only know what someone, I assume a social worker, felt was worthy of documenting. I didn’t learn that my maternal grandmother’s brother roger was forced into multiple residential schools from tracy-lynn or her mother rita, I learnt from a fucking hydro company. How colonial dystopian is that? Hydro Manitoba did a study of the land they intended to put pipelines through, consulting the nation which neighbours my own. My nation is Tootinaowaziibeeng First Nation, physically within Treaty 2 territory but a signatory of Treaty 4. I’ve lived most of my life on Treaty 4 land, i.e. the land stolen from the Métis (michif), Cree (néhiyaw), and Ojibway (anishinaabe). My adoptive dad Arlon is a descendant of the first British & French settlers in the region and he didn’t know which Indigenous peoples lived on the land that makes up our family farm-turned-acreage until I told him. To him, the land was always in the family and was empty before, owned by the canadian government that gave it to his family. As a socially anxious young adult he was set up on a dinner date with my adoptive mom, Tracey. She was also from a white farming family, her childhood home being just 2 km down the road from where mine still sits today. Growing up she embraced the cuisine of her German ancestry, that was all her mother taught her. If I remember correctly, she’s mostly German, but had Jewish family survive the Holocaust, becoming refugees to Canada after leaving the Netherlands. I’m unsure if they were Dutch Jewish, I never asked. Despite having 3 known sides of family, I’ve always been distanced from them in some way. When I was young my mom told me the reason we didn’t spend time with distant family was because they were “mean” to her. As a teenager I learnt “mean” actually meant racist, they were upset with her for adopting an “Indian” baby.

Like Toni Morrison, much of my own literary (and musical) background comes from autobiographies. Now that I think about it, I’m surrounded by autobiographical creations. I can prove this on the spot by looking down at my phone next to me, Spotify open, playing Boujee Natives by Snotty Nose Rez Kids, a hiphop duo from Haisla First Nation. That song is on my ndn rap playlist, below it is my hiphop for sexy ppl only playlist which contains only Black/African rappers. I hit shuffle on the playlist and Malcolm Garvey Huey by Dead Prez comes on, ironic as I get to read works by/about these exact historical figures for this geography class. If I look into my backpack next to me I’ll find Dancing On Our Turtle’s Back by Leanne Betasamosake Simpson (Michi Saagiig Nishnaabeg) and Creeland by Dallas Hunt (Swan River First Nation), both autobiographical works to an extent. That’s just my immediate surroundings here at a cafe near my house, I typically exist near a shelf of autobiographies at my two library jobs, as well as at home in East Van.

Where would I go? If I wrote an autobiography what section would they put me in? Would it still be autobiography if so much of my family knowledge comes from government documents like an adoption act or residential school records? Would my Indigeneity render it a historical work? If I have to rely on historical evidence to make a guess, does that make my life a fiction? Assuming an Indigenous category exists, who makes the decision on whether I’m too Black to belong? Perhaps I’ll write a biomythography like Audre Lorde. The sisters have it figured out this time, I know where’d I go. 

If past you were to meet future me, Would you be holding me here and now?

[Historians – Lucy Dacus]

References :

Afromarxist, “What's in a Name? ft. Kwame Ture (1989)” YouTube, video publication date 27 October 2019, https://youtu.be/OGcl359SMxE?si=T_bs5PKLBZuUYwZ0

Baldwin, James. Notes of a Native Son. Boston: Beacon Press, 1955. 

Chakasim, Neegahnii Madeline. “Pretendians and their Impacts on Indigenous Communities.” The Indigenous Foundation, May 10 2022. https://www.theindigenousfoundation.org/articles/pretendians-and-their-impacts-on-indigenous-communities 

HTFC Planning & Design & Manitoba Hydro. “See what the land gave us” Waywayseecappo First Nation Traditional Knowledge Study For the Birtle Transmission Line. December 2017. https://www.hydro.mb.ca/docs/projects/birtle/appendix_c_waywayseecappo_tk_study_final_report.pdf 

Lucy Dacus. Historians. Jacob Blizard and Collin Pastore. March 2, 2018. Matador Records, digital streaming.

Books / music mentioned

dead prez. Malcolm Garvey Huey. June 22 2010. Boss Up Inc., digital streaming. 

Hunt, Dallas. Creeland. Gibsons: Nightwood Editions, 2021.

*Maynard, Robyn. Policing Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from Slavery to the Present. Winnipeg: Fernwood Publishing, 2017. 

Lorde, Audre. Zami: A New Spelling of My Name. New York: Crossing Press, 1982.

Phoebe Bridgers. ICU. Phoebe Bridgers, Marshall Vore, & Nicholas White. June 18, 2020. Dead Oceans, digital streaming.

Snotty Nose Rez Kids. Boujee Natives. May 10 2019. Independent, digital streaming. 

Simpson, Leanne Betasamosake. Dancing on Our Turtle’s Back: Stories of Nishnaabeg Re-Creation, Resurgence, and a New Emergence. Winnipeg: Arbeiter Ring Publishing, 2011. 

*Simpson, Leanne Betasamosake. As We Have Always Done. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2017. 

sources with * were in the original essay but omitted from this version

#original writing #academic essay #uhh #personal essay #autobiography #history #pan africanism #indigenous #indigenous writer #black academia #first nations #native american #creative writing #actuallyindigenous #ojibwe #ojibway #ojibwa #i love how many spellings exist lmao it's hell #saulteaux #nakawe #anishinaabe #treaty 4 #prose #indigiqueer #queer #queer writers #uhhh #im running out of ideas #trans writers #riley writes

[itsrottenwork]

Hi mj!! Secret Santa here!! Hope your Tuesday is going/has gone well so far!!✨

Oh, my!! Well, I bid you good luck on the rest of this semester then!! What are you studying? I just graduated in 2021 with a bachelors in Art Therapy with a sculpture minor!! Been trying to conjure up plans to obtain my masters, but that’s not in the cards just yet!! We’ll see what the future holds though!! 😅

That’s nice that you learned how to crochet since you were younger!! That’s the advantage you have lol!! It definitely takes muscle memory to understand how to hold the needles and when to do the loops lol!! I’m gonna do my best to try and pick up the skill again!! Can’t promise it will go well lol!!

Blue and purple truly are such cozy colors!! I agree 100% about autumn being the best season!! Especially that transitional period where it’s not warm enough to wear shorts anymore, but also not too cold that you have to wear multiple layers!! Oooooo plants!! What kind of plants do you have?! Two or three summers ago, I started to grow/take care of some succulents and cacti!! Due to the ever-changing climate, not many of them survived except for my cacti! They’ve been going two years strong, even through the harshest weather!! Lol. Mexican food really is the way to go!! Honestly, any Latin American food is the way to go, in my eyes!! Right behind it for me has to be Italian cuisine!! You studied in Northern Ireland? Love that for you!! Did you visit any particular place while you were there? In the beginning of 2020, I studied abroad in Florence for 2 months before the pandemic hit! While I was homesick a lot of the time, I truly did love my time there!! One of these days I’ll have to go back!!

More Speed Round Questions!! Do you have a piece of comfort clothing/shoes that you love to wear? Have you been to any concerts this year? If so, who did you see? Favorite TV Show/Movie you’ve seen this year? What’s your favorite candle scent? Mine has to be anything with pumpkin/cranberry lol. 🎄✨

thank you!! I'm finished with classes now, but we've got lots of essays due after the winter break, and I've got an exam which I hate. but it's nice that the classes are out of the way now. I study politics and communication, but wow art therapy sounds really really cool!! I didn't even know that was something you could get a degree in. I have friends who did art degrees and are looking at grad school, and they say it's much more common to take some time off in between to build your portfolio and whatnot, rather than going straight into it, so don't worry, you've got time 😊

just the way things have worked out for me, I've had a different plant pretty much every year of uni, either stealing one of my mom's or gifting it back to her at the end of the year haha. right now I have five little succulents, they're doing alright but I don't think they're doing as well as the ones I had last year, I had a better pot for them and the space was better. I was in belfast when I studied abroad (the first time) but I travelled around a bit while I was there so I saw lots of different parts of northern ireland. I also went to venice to see the biennale in 2019, but that was the only european travel I did that semester. that's so cool that you were in florence, it's such a lovely city!! but what a rough time to be there, I know things were pretty bad in italy earlier than most places (I was in australia at the time, so we were sheltered from it for much longer). I hope you're able to go back and enjoy it more!!

speed round answers!!

comfort clothes: I have a necklace and two rings that I always wear that each mean a lot to me, but if we're talking comforting, my friend gave me these jingle bell reindeer antlers a few years back and something about jingling around makes it hard to feel down so yeah regardless of the season I'll wear those if I'm in a bad mood

concerts: I haven't seen any this year!! I debated getting tickets to one, but I couldn't get them, and honestly crowded spaces are not the vibe anymore

favorite show/movie this year: why is it I've forgotten everything I've watched this year now you've asked me that? I watched a lot more youtube/streamers than traditional shows/films

favorite candle scent: specifically candles? something cinnamon spices that makes the house all cozy

#txt #ask #anon #holiday pals 2022

[berryunho]

omg i know how u feel i don't think i'll be graduating in 4 bc i have to do co-op terms so it delays my grad by a year or smth?? we'll see how things go

wow that's so cool!! the dedication is immaculate i would always give up after a month or so. do you know any other languages aside from eng and korean?

ooo i'm kinda the opposite like nothing really interests me outside of courses in my major or other science courses. i've gotta do some arts credits and scrolling thru them is like... okay this sounds interesting then i read the syllabus and its like readings and essays and discussion groups then im like NOPE LOL BYE

that's so funny cause i saw someone sleeping in a corner of the stairs. ppl will sleep anywhere and i don't blame them. could you imagine falling asleep near the river ugh bless

omg yes like with chem i always end up working backwards from the answer (wink wonk) to see what i did wrong and usually it's a lot 😭

it wasn't too bad! it was kinda cold but not windy so i was okay. i still brought a jacket with me cause it was windy af during the day and i thought it'd be the same at night but nope there goes my money for coat check 😭

ohh!! that sounds fun, did you manage to find anything? red hair is so nice. everyone i've seen so far with red hair pulls it off so well and i'm lowkey convinced it's a colour that works on everyone....

thank you!! i did have lots of fun : D i might've died on the bus ride back... but we don't talk abt it..........

-mightychondria

yeahhh i have to get a masters degree for the profession im aiming for so... if everything goes to plan that's six years of university and i do NOT want it to be more 😭😭 hopefully your graduation doesn't get delayed too much ??

:LKFJDKFSJD:LFKJ oh boy languages and me... lowkey obsessed w learning them SO one set of my grandparents were german and didnt speak english so i know very basic german (my dad didnt think it was important to teach me. crying screaming throwing up.) and i got to be pretty okay at finnish at one point but i've forgotten ALL of it lol and i took 2 years of latin in highschool which was very fun but again i forgot most of it KLFJSFDLJK AND FINALLY i took a couple years of american sign language in middle school but i literally remember the alphabet and basic kindness' :'] ive also attempted swedish, norwegian, spanish, and french with ... immediate failure ! hehe

i get what you mean 😭for me its not that i dislike my stem courses but i actually love reading and writing essays and stuff and i just wish i could do more of that 😭 but the majority of my stem friends definitely would agree w you LOL

ugh for real it would be so nice to sleep outside in the sun i feel like ... living out that cat/dog life ... but id be too scared of being kidnapped LKJJFSKFJKS

that is definitely the way to do chem 😭 just gotta learn from your mistakes until there are none ! i had an exam last friday and ... i should be getting that grade tonight or tomorrow so im very anxiously waiting to see how i did ...

nooooo not the coat check money... i cannot even imagine how much clubs make in the winter just from coat check like 😭 some nights at one of my local clubs its literally more expensive to check your coat than to get in 😭

sadly i still havent figured out who/what to be... i think im gonna wait to dye my hair though so that it lasts longer ... so i really dk LOL im lazy tbh so i normally go for something i can just wear my normal clothes for... and since i just finished breaking bad im thinking maybe jane ??? i dress like her irl (though less 2008) and id just need a wig LKJFS:LDJKF BUT IDK !!! do you have any costumes in mind? or any plans?

hehe im glad you had fun but ... 👀 ... how ominous ... hehe i hope your week starts off nicely !! :]

#mightychondria anon #answered

[florenceisfalling]

31. “I’m not superstitious.” with Henrik and whoever!

hfkljsdklf im still not sure how i feel about this?? but might as well stop procrastinating it haha, hope you like it!!

this is my second request for 31 so sorry if its a lot like the other one fksdjfl

Marvin leans over and nudges Henrik’s smallest potted plant to the side, lifting the key underneath. He shoves it into his coat pocket and rolls his eyes. After all the wild things they’ve been through, most of the egos let Marv make better places for their keys and important belongings, magic hideaways only designated people could access. But not Schneep - “unnecessary,” he said. His stubbornness has a tendency to override his intelligence.

Bracelets clang and jingle together as he lifts his arm to the keyhole. With a creak, the door opens, and the sound of shattering soon follows.

Mild panic, if that’s the term for it, tugs at Marv’s features. “Henrik?” he calls out, letting magic start to rush to his fingertips.

All that comes in response is a string of German curses, ended by a grumbled “Marvin.”

The magician compels his hands, and the power within them, to cool. “Henrik.”

Once again, the door has creaked closed, and Marvin makes his way to the source of the noise.

Still wearing the clothes he slept in, the doctor stands in his bedroom, rubbing at his eyes and making incoherent noises of frustration. Beside his feet, a hand mirror sits in broken pieces on the floor.

“How’d that happen?”

“I… I punched it.” Henrik mutters, while setting his glasses back on his face. “Aiming for my alarm clock. Off button.”

Marv bursts into laughter and puts his arm against the wall to stable himself. “Oh my gods. Not quite sure if punching is the suited word for that, but- oh my gods.”

Henrik gives him a gentle shove, before running calloused fingers through his own hair to fix the disheveled look. It does not help.

“You know, Hen,” Marvin begins, “I was simply dropping by to return your books, but now, I figure I might have to stay a while, lend you some help.”

“Why’s that?”

“You broke a mirror, of course! Plenty of bad luck for you, sir.”

Schneep groans and pushes past him. “I do not believe in that.”

Marvin giggles, following his friend into the kitchen. “What, Lady Luck? Or just in this circumstance?”

“I believe you’re a… jester?” Henrik tries, glancing back at Marv. The magician seems to be almost glowing, his eyes shining. His colorful sweater and excessive jewelry are a sharp contrast to the kitchen, which is cast in blues and devoid of any sort of decor. Distracted, the doctor snaps back to his focus on name-calling. “Wait, wait, no. A fool, that’s it.”

“How unkind,” Marvin sarcastically responds as he grabs two coffee mugs.

“Hm, but maybe I could incorporate some jester aesthetic into my next stage outfit, channel some Harley Quinn, I’m sure Jackie’d love it…” he jokes, pushing a mug into the doctor’s hand. “Oh, Henrik, bless you! My muse!”

Henrik chuckles, making the coffee, and Marvin hops up on the counter to watch. It smells amazing, and he rests his head gently back against the tiles on the wall. Peaceful.

“Doc, I believe there is a severe need to redecorate this place.”

“…Yes.” Carefully, he hands Marv a cup, and leans back on the counter beside him.

They both take slow sips. “You never answered my question, before. Do you not believe in that kind of thing, darling doctor?”

Schneep chuckles. “Nein.”

A wink, and then illusions are dancing along the magician’s fingertips, like tiny fractals of fireworks. “Are you certain, love?”

Henrik grumbles into his coffee mug, and follows with a nod.

The colorful lights vanish in a flash. A playful smirk spreads across Marvin’s face as he bounds across the house to the living room couch. “What is this, then? What are we who are ego, character, fiction?” His tone lightens as he obnoxiously flails his arms. “Dimension-hopping? An anomaly in space-time?”

Henrik is silent, but a smile starts to grace his features as well as he leaves the kitchen and sits on the sofa next to Marvin, rolling his eyes.

Marvin breaks into a dramatic falsetto. “Tell me! Have pity on my foolish mind, and give me a glimpse into the genius mind of Dr. Henrik von Schneeplesti-”

One more well-meaning shove from the doctor, and Marv ungracefully tumbles from couch to floor. Luckily, his coffee is sitting on a side table, rather than now spilled out across the room.

“What, magic man? All your power and you can’t fly?” Henrik kids, before reaching out a hand to help him up from his predicament.

Marvin hangs his head, admitting mock defeat. “Perhaps not.”

As they sit together, awkwardly sprawled out across the cushions, Marv yanks Henrik’s smudged glasses right off his face, intent on cleaning them.

Schneep sighs, blinking, letting his eyes adjust while his guest scrubs away at the lenses he holds.

“I never said I do not believe in… whatever you are,” Henrik sighs. “I just do not… I am not su.. supernat- no, wrong -”

“Superstitious?” Marvin offers, inspecting the glasses in the sunlight that streams through the shutters.

“I am not superstitious. I do not think that black cats make life difficult, or anything of that sort.”

The magician laughs, sloppily planting the glasses back on Schneep’s face. “Black cats are only bad luck if you’re cruel to them. That’s why I’m so lucky: I’ve got all those sweet little kittens I take care of.”

“You are not lucky, you are stubborn for what you want.”

“You’re one to talk!”

Henrik snorts and straightens his glasses. “Maybe.”

“But no, you’re right, you’re right,” Marv admits. “I don’t think the universe decides our fate based off such little things, either. Mirrors, numbers, umbrellas… they’re insignificant compared to the course of life. I believe everything happens for a reason, a real reason. A scheme, if you will.”

“I do not understand that,” Henrik speaks, his voice suddenly low. “What about th- the time I spent gone with… h-him - or… or Chase’s… incident? Everything… awful. What kind of reason fixes those? Not fair.”

Marvin draws closer to his friend. “Never said it was a good reason. The universe often can be cruel and uncaring, and the exchanges aren’t always fair. But the reason’s still there, and you’re still a part of it. It’s comforting, I think, to know you’re important - even if it’s the unpleasant kind of important.”

Henrik fidgets with the tag on the edge of one of his throw pillows. “Maybe, sure. Important.”

“You’re important to me, at the very least,” Marvin sighs, then grins again. “Maybe you need a black cat, Henrik. One to take care of, see if Lady Luck really does watch the little things.”

Henrik proceeds to violently swing the throw pillow at Marvin’s face.

#lotsa dialogue in this one #kinda bleh about it #fic requests #my writing #my fics #my ego posts #my ego hcs #henrik von schneeplestein #marvin the magnificent #jse egos #ALSO HOW DID THIS END UP BEING LONGER THAN SOME OF MY SCHOOL ESSAYS

[jungkxook]

—out of the blue. (m)

⟶ pairing: jungkook x reader 

⟶ genre: youtuber/gamer!jungkook + fluff / smut 

⟶ words: 5,204

⟶ rating: 18+

⟶ summary: catching your boyfriend bleaching and dyeing his hair for a livestream is definitely not what you expected — but it certainly has its perks.

⟶ warnings: established relationship, some attempt at humour, .2 seconds of sort of sub jungkook (you just like seeing him on his knees), you call jungkook a good boy, shower sex, hair pulling, oral sex, face riding, standing sex, breast play, cum eating, doggy style, unprotected sex, creampie

⟶ note: because blue haired jungkook has me feeling all sorts of things. also dedicating this to the lovely ryen @kithtaehyung​ because blue haired jungkook is getting her too and i hope this helps!! and thank you to the wonderful @gamerkooks​ and @stanrandomthings​ for always giving me inspiration for gamer jungkook <3

“What the hell are you doing?”

Jungkook has less than a second to react when he hears you bursting through the door of his bedroom, a guilty expression plastered on his face as if you’ve caught him in the midst of a much worse act than what he’s already currently doing ━ but the flustered scowl deepening your countenance is enough for him to certainly feel that way, because how else is he supposed to casually explain why he’s currently sitting shirtless in front of a camera?

Admittedly, the sight is odd enough, and there’s a split moment where your incredulous look is enough to make him feel as if he’s wronged you, and your six month long relationship with him, entirely before he remembers that he didn’t actually do anything wrong like cheat on you, but is actually just trying to dye his hair.

He’s sat in his gaming chair, camera and lights set up around him, and the monitor of his desktop all recording his face to the hundreds of thousands of viewers currently watching his livestream. He had told you well in advance about his aim to do a twenty-four hour live broadcast for his subscribers to both raise money for a donation and to countdown to his next subscriber milestone with the help of his friends ━ and had even asked you to help him plan the event, discussing it animatedly with you for the past month on various occasions ━ but mainly just because Jungkook is crazy enough to sit through a twenty-four hour stream and call it fun.

You had known most of how the entirety of the day would go. Starting from noon the previous day to now, almost an hour before the stream ends, thus far he’s done various gameplays from Minecraft to Overwatch to Among Us simultaneously with his friends who had offered to marathon with him the twenty-four hour event; had a period of time in which Jimin and Taehyung were over and cramped in his room to answer questions and talk to viewers but mostly just to create absolute chaos. You had been there for most of it, though you’re still trying to figure out if it’s a blessing or a curse that you were suckered into paying rent for your three bedroom apartment by Taehyung more than a year ago, and subsequently falling madly in love with Jungkook and forcing you to aid in his antics. You’ve been in a handful of his videos before, appearing in Twitch and YouTube streams, and in the background of vlogs in his channel and the channels belonging to the other boys; and, on that day for Jungkook’s twenty-four hour event, you had joined him at the start before being dragged away for work and then tried to pull an all-nighter with him until you crashed on the couch in the living room, and checking in on him occasionally to give him food and water and to just generally make sure your boyfriend isn’t dead.

Now, with the remaining final hour dwindling down, you had been in your room trying to finish last minute essay writing for school, with your phone propped up on your desk and Jungkook’s livestream playing as background noise to your studying. One minute, he had been playing a round of Among Us, and the next, when you had glanced up, he had the bottle in hand and the detrimental blue dye coating his hair in slick globs. It wouldn’t have been so shocking, had you not seen Jungkook an hour ago when he had his natural dark hair still, and now he had somehow managed to sneak in bleaching his hair in the time you had left him. Maybe it was your fault for not catching it sooner, if only because you had sheepishly taken a small nap amidst your studying only to wake up to a nightmare.

Which is where that leaves you currently, dishevelled demeanour standing at the threshold of his door after chasing over to his room, watching as Taehyung helps Jungkook sufficiently ruin his beautiful hair which you love so much.

“Uh… Dyeing my hair?” Jungkook finally answers, dumbfounded. He’s fortunate he had pulled off his shirt to avoid getting hair dye on it, an old towel now draped around his shoulders to catch any excess mess. He adds brightly, “We asked for suggestions on how to end the stream and someone said I should dye my hair, so Tae got the stuff.”

“You bleached your own hair?” You retort, exasperated. “When the hell did all this happen? I’ve been next door to you the whole time! What if your hair falls out? You should’ve gotten a professional to do it, not Tae━”

Taehyung looks inexplicably offended by your slandering remarks on his (lack of) hair styling skills, retorting with, “Yo, what the━?”

Jungkook blinks, as if just being made aware of what he’s actually doing.

“My hair’s gonna fall out?” he gaps. “Guys, what the hell? Why’d no one tell me?”

He looks from you to Taehyung then over at the comments on his livestream which are currently flooding with the sole topic of you. His eyes snag the first few that appear to him in the frenzied influx of words:

uh oh jungkook’s sleeping on the floor tonight

oh shit run bro

f in the chat for jk’s hair

get him y/n!!!!

“Dude, she’s just being dramatic,” Taehyung waves you off. He ducks out of the way when you reach out to Jungkook’s bed for a pillow and chuck it at the older boy’s head.

“And when he’s bald, then what━”

“No!” A helpless Jungkook exclaims suddenly. He gestures wildly to the stream, “Don’t give them ideas. The edits are gonna start pouring in.”

“Jeon, look, it’s too late to go back now,” Taehyung says. “You’ve got half your head covered in dye and three minutes to go with the stream. How bad can it be?”

A groveling sigh eclipses your lips as you push yourself forward. “Then at least let me help before you ruin it completely.”

Jungkook’s fortunate, to say the least, though he’s left wondering if you’re truly upset with him.

He finishes the countdown to the end of his twenty-four hour stream with you and Taehyung putting the last remaining globs of dye on his hair, a heartfelt goodbye to his viewers who marathoned the stream with him, and a promise to update them on the status of his hair when he washes the dye out.

And, just as soon as he’s shut his camera off, the mundane world returns to him.

It’s no longer millions of anonymous and faceless viewers watching him from the other side of their screens in the tiny bubble that is his room, but just you and Taehyung and the older boy’s frisky little Pomeranian dog and the threat of a wallowing regret as Jungkook thinks to himself, what the hell did he truly just do to his hair?

At some point, Taehyung retreats to his girlfriend’s house taking Yeontan with him, leaving you alone with Jungkook and he basks in the sudden cozy quiet after twenty-four hours of madness as the adrenaline rush begins to fade and mellow out. Back aching, joints cracking and popping as he stretches and moves, and eyes burning in the similar way they do from having stared at a screen for too long, but tenfold, he craves nothing more than to find your sweet and comforting touch to end such a long day.

He finds you in the living room already scrolling through your phone and your Twitter feed to read and marvel at all the comments and memes made by his viewers during his stream and his heart threatens to burst through his chest because you’ve always been so supportive of him and his fans, and they’ve always adored you and your endless interactions with them. So, surely, you can’t be mad at him for bleaching and dyeing his hair. Right?

As his arms come to wrap around you from behind, face nuzzling in the crook of your neck, he hears you bemoan, “You look like a Smurf came on your head.”

Wrong.

Well, not entirely, he guesses. You do lean into his chest, practically melting against him. A sluggish grin tugs at his lips and, instead, he chooses to ask, “Shower with me?”

“Aren’t you tired, Koo?”

“Baby,” he deadpans, and your heart flutters just a little bit, “by this point, I’m running solely on Red Bull and coffee that I’m positive I could fight the gods with my bare hands and win. In fact, I’ve had so much caffeine that I’m fairly certain I’ve ascended to the astral plane. Besides, I need to wash this dye out, and I could use some help. Sleep can wait.”

“Help,” You snort. “You’re such a liar. I already know what you want.”

“To spend time with my beautiful girlfriend? You’re right.”

“I’m not sucking your dick.”

He pulls his head back to look at you. Though he tries to look offended, there’s the tiniest of smirks on his face. “Wasn’t gonna ask you!”

You turn to properly face him in his arms and shoot him a dubious glance. He leans down to press a chilling kiss to your jaw, then nudges his nose against you in the same spot so that you’ll move your head. You do so, despite your prior scolding, and let him kiss the underside of your jaw down to your neck.

“Okay, fine,” You huff finally.

You relent, miraculously, but Jungkook had already guessed you would the moment he had found you in the living room and he couldn’t be happier.

He cherishes the moments alone with you, has come to know them well as he falls into a comfortable routine with you away from prying eyes over the last few months. Because sometimes, as he comes to learn, it’s hard to establish a relationship when his job requires him to be in the spotlight often. What is authentic and what is simply fabricated for views is difficult to discern, and yet you’re patient with him. Not everything to him is money and views and numbers, or what his next big plan is, or how you could potentially help him in some way (despite knowing that any video featuring you seems to skyrocket his views and land his videos on the trending page of YouTube more often than not because he knows everyone loves you more than him). You know when he’s his online persona and when he’s simply just Jungkook, and while there’s hardly any difference between the two, his online personality surely has to maintain a level of privacy and happiness that may not always be true.

At least with you, he can just be himself. He can finally be at ease.

Showering together is just one of the many acts of normalcy he cherishes with you. So, he turns on the shower and lets the bathroom get all warm and balmy as you undress. He’s the first one inside, hissing in delight as he lets the water run over his sore muscles, washing out the dye in his hair firstly so as not to get it on you and fortunately not making too much of a mess of blue dye in the tub. You’ve joined him in an instant when he’s nearly done, squeezing into the space in front of him as you shut the glass door behind you, the pane already beginning to fog and slick with droplets of condensation. He pulls you into him once more, nestling his chin on your shoulder as his hands come to wrap around you. They slide across your front, all wet and soapy, briefly gliding across your breasts, palms brushing against your nipples before traveling down to your navel.

“Congrats, baby,” You coo gently. “Twenty-four hours.”

He murmurs into your hair, “Missed you loads though.”

You turn to look at him finally, and it’s hard not to stare. Your eyes land firstly on his abdomen and the toned muscles there, trailing up to his arm and the pretty tattoos that decorate every inch of his skin, to his soft pink lips and his big eyes. Then, there’s the matter of his hair. The water has done most of the work in washing out the dye from his hair, now falling across his forehead and into his eyes and cheekbones, and it’s only then that you fully register the dye has worked as you struggle to find any remnants of his once-ebony-then-blonde locks. The blue hair is an obvious stark contrast to his natural hair and, you think, it is pretty, accentuating his radiant skin and making his eyes pop.

“I didn’t think you were actually serious all those times you said you wanted to change your hair.” Your lips are pursed as you survey him now, your fingers twirling a strand of his tresses around and around as you inspect it.

He smiles, catching your hand and pressing a quick peck to your knuckles. “Neither did I,” he admits sheepishly. “It sort of just happened.”

You pout. “I’m gonna miss your natural hair.”

“Do you really hate it blue?”

“I don’t hate it. Was more scared you’d ruin your pretty hair and make it all fall out.”

At this, Jungkook flashes you a cheeky smile. He holds his head a little higher. “So you still think my hair is pretty?”

“I think you’re a dork,” You clarify. “And, aside from the fact you almost gave me a heart attack, I’d say the blue is so pretty. Beyond pretty. Kinda hot, if I’m being honest.”

Because you’re not really mad, but it’s fun just to tease Jungkook and see his reactions. At the very least, he can sense this, as it’s apparent with the way his smile stretches even wider on his face.

“Hot, huh?”

“Mhm. But you didn’t hear that from me.”

He feigns a look of mock hurt. “Oh no. You must be really mad. Want me to make it up to you?”

“How are you gonna do that?”

“Well, what do you want from me?”

You take a moment to think it over, but the answer is already obvious enough. It’s one that even he knows, and one that has won you over the moment Jungkook was freed from his stream. You hum aloud, “You, on your knees, head between my legs, like a good boy. Think I can get a better viewpoint of your hair from down there anyway before I judge it.”

“Like a good boy?” A dark smirk tugs at his face. “So now who’s the needy one?”

He lowers his head so that he’s leaving a trail of sloppy wet kisses down your neck to your collarbones. As you let yourself get carried away for a moment, you wrap your arm around his neck, pulling him backwards until you’re pressed up against the glass door. He ducks even lower, kissing just above your left breast and then catching your nipple between his teeth. You swallow thickly, rubbing your thighs together, reminding yourself to respond to him.

“It’s not my fault when you were busy for the past day,” You pout. “And the blue hair really is sexy.”

“Aha!” he straightens up in front of you suddenly, a crooked smug smile on his face. “So I’m not just hot. I’m sexy.”

“You’re literally always sexy. And beautiful too. It’s almost unfair.”

“That’s even better.”

You tug your fingers at his damp locks. When you speak, your voice is a mix between urgency and a whine. “Jungkook. I could’ve already gotten off with my hand at this point.”

“Ouch, feisty!” He pokes his fingers at your sides. Then, nipping a little more firmly on the soft skin of your breast, murmurs huskily, “Alright, alright. But only if you call me a good boy again.”

Part of him is taunting you, but there’s a small sliver of intrigue that makes the thought in his head and the pretty words on your tongue excite him to no end.

Still, you choose to entertain him, maybe a little drowsily and entirely consumed by him, “I will if you let me ride your face.”

A rumble of a chuckle resonates from him. You find him on his knees in the next moment, wedging himself between your thighs. He nudges one of your legs and you follow the wordless command, hitching one thigh over his shoulder as you settle back against the glass door of the shower. He kisses at your hips as he dips his head lower and lower to where you want him, before swiping his tongue at your cunt, tasting all of you at once.

“Mmm, Koo━” A soft whimper sounds from you, making his head swim.

He wastes no time in lapping at your folds, tongue delving into you deeper and deeper as he cranes his neck. The wetness that pools between your legs and on the tip of his tongue is a sticky mess that he basks in just a little longer.

“Fuck,” he groans into your pussy, “you taste so fucking good. Missed this so much.”

His hands are big as they come to hold you close, cradling your ass, your thighs, your hips, anything to pull you into him while simultaneously pushing your thighs further apart.

You manage to find your voice and quip weakly, “Missed me or having your head between my legs?”

“You, definitely,” he murmurs. He busies himself by reaching out with his thumb to press circles against your clit. Your mouth falls open in a silent moan, hips rutting into his face. “All of you.”

“Jungkook━ Fuck━”

He burrows further into you, humming in response. His nose brushes against your clit, the muscle of his tongue a pleasant wet that makes you warm all over. You give another experimental swivel of your hips, grinding against his tongue just right. He pinches at your hips as if to probe you onward, and then you do it again, and again, desperately rocking your hips back and forth against him. Your fingers reach out to grab a fistful of his hair, clutching it so tightly he hisses. But you’re right. The blue locks look dazzling between your legs, being pulled by your hands as you push him further into you.

His eyes meet yours from below your waist, hooded and idle, enjoying the view as you squirm and writhe above him, shamelessly riding his face. Grinding against his chin, nose, and tongue, the slick wetness you leave behind glistens on his skin.

“Ah, Koo━” You cry out. “Fuck, I’m gonna━!”

Your orgasm hits you violently, sending you keeling. Your hips continue with reckless abandon, and Jungkook presses his finger against your clit a little harder, a little faster. The abrupt gushing warmth between your thighs sends your mind spinning, as the steam from the shower and your panting breaths begin to fog the bathroom. When your hips begin to slow, Jungkook laps at the rest of your leaking core before pulling away with a grin brandishing his shimmering face. He lets you pull him up eagerly, clumsy hands fumbling to hold either side of his face as you tug at him.

“God, you’re so hot, babe,” he sighs wistfully, smothering your lips with his for an all too chaste kiss, before leaning in once more to nibble at your lower lip.

“Wanna feel you, Koo,” You prompt urgently. “Want you in me.”

Jungkook hastens to comply, his hands falling to your waist. “Go on, then. Turn around for me.”

You don’t need to be told twice. You spin so that you’re facing the glass sliding door, your back to him. You watch him over your shoulder, momentarily admiring his well built stature, the tattoos that ink his body, and the water that shimmers on his skin. He has to push his wet hair up and away when it falls across his forehead and then he reaches down to grasp at his length, grip tight around his shaft so that he can pump himself sluggishly a few short times. It’s almost painful to watch him jerk himself off in front of you, the tip a burning red and glistening. He catches you staring and decides to catch you off guard when he grabs a hold of your hips with one hand. He yanks you towards him, your ass pressed firmly against his hips, making you jump from the startle, and grins when you look back at him.

Then, ever so slowly, he runs the length of his cock along your folds. Before you can brace yourself for the overwhelming rush of pleasure, he’s sliding his cock past your folds, burrowing into you deep. He curses behind you, his other hand flying out to steady himself by digging into your hip.

“Fffuck. Shit.” He dips his head so that his cheek is resting against your shoulder and sputters for air. “Jesus, fuck━ Been dying to feel you all day.”

He fits so snugly in you, so perfectly, just like always and you take him so well, coaxed by your own arousal. He ruts his hips forward into yours and you nearly fall forward before catching yourself by pressing your palms to the glass. Then, he’s grinding against you, small and precise thrusts that roll into your hips.

“Mmm, Jungkook,” you choke out. “You feel so━ So good.”

“Ah, shit,” he hisses. “Wanna wreck you so bad.”

He angles his chest a little more, pummels his dick into you in such a way that he’s hitting a different spot in you. His eyes stay fixated on the soft, round flesh of your ass and the way his cock slips so easily into you, brows screwed in concentration, jaw clenched. The slight bounce of your ass each time he rolls his hips firmly against you, the way you ricochet forward each time in tandem with his moves. You bow your head, pressing your temple against the glass door now tinted with condensation, only marked up by the imprints of your fingers grasping at anything. It’s almost sweltering hot in the shower now but you both pay no mind to it. He fucks into you with such languid, steady strides, cock beginning to throb and twitch in anticipation. You feel so wet, such a pitiless mess between your thighs already that it makes him growl.

“H-Harder,” You mewl. “Oh, Koo━”

He almost slips behind you in his eagerness to obey, awakening something animalistic in him, a yearning to just release all the tension in his core. This time, he adapts a measured pace, forceful thrusts that have you crying out in delight each time. One hand reaches up to grip at your shoulder to steady himself while his other slithers around your front to grasp at your breasts, all wet and supple, pinching at your nipples.

“So good,” he moans, pressing sloppy kisses just below your ear. His breath is hot as he pants behind you, sending tingles down your spine. “Fuck━”

His voice is cut off by a whine, hips bucking forward in an unsolicited manner as he feels his high drawing near. You lean your head onto his shoulder, stretching your arm out so that you can tug desperately at his hair. It’s a silent, simple command, but it’s one that he immediately understands even without you speaking.

“Wanna feel you━” You whimper. “Wanna see you.”

Jungkook nearly slips as he fumbles to pull out of you, hissing at the loss of warmth and friction. As soon as you’ve turned to face him, he wastes no time in closing the distance between you. He pushes his leaking cock past your folds once more and continues at the same pace as if he had never even stopped to begin with.

“Fuck,” he whines. “Not gonna last━”

You wrap your arms around his neck, drawing him even closer to you, as he presses you against the glass. He hitches one of your thighs around his waist, spreading your legs just wide enough to hit a certain spot that has both of you crying out. You’re clinging so tightly to him, fingers digging harshly into his skin in an attempt to alleviate the building pressure you feel. He knows you’ve almost reached your end when you resort to a gasping, moaning mess, writhing beneath his broad stature.

“Close, baby?” he hums.

You open your mouth to respond but can only muster a whimper. His pace treads over to heedlessly frantic, the sound of skin against skin and the lewd wetness filling the shower. Despite his hips pounding into yours so harshly, his fingers flutter so delicately under your chin, grasping it and moving your head just enough so that you’re facing him.

“Lemme see you,” he grunts. “Wanna watch you when you cum all over my cock. Always so pretty.”

“I━ I’m━ Fuck, Koo━”

But you can’t finish your thought.

You keep your gaze fixated on Jungkook’s, however exhausted and weary it may be. Your lashes flutter, brows knit together, and you suck your lower lip between your teeth, biting so hard Jungkook’s certain you’ll bruise it. Another few hard thrusts and then you’re reaching your high, overcome by such an intense burning that you can’t help but look away out of instinct. You cry his name, face contorting in pure pleasure, and chest arching to meet his. You’re clenching so tightly around him has him sputtering for air, nearly collapsing entirely against you. You’re near dripping around his cock which only means he almost slips from you with each draw of his hips that he makes. It’s why he sloppily rocks his hips into yours, desperate to reach his own high as well.

When you return to your senses, blinking away your blurry vision, you can make out Jungkook cooing into your ear, “That’s it, baby. Doing so well.”

You meet his gaze once more, only this time you’re perhaps even more tired. Hooded eyes watch him, silently probing him to his climax. He comes tumbling towards it, a few more short thrusts of his hips and, finally, he’s there. He slams his hips up into yours one final time, crying out, and then he’s releasing into you in an overwhelming abrupt gush. Only he can’t quite enjoy it because, out of genuine accident and driven by impatience to just get off, the last jerk of his hips hits you a little too hard.

It’s what causes you to slip backward and he, so lost in his own reverie, hardly has a proper grip on you or where he’s standing. When you lose your footing beneath you, slipping on the wet porcelain of the tub, and comes crashing down, he’s brought along with you. “Oh, fuck━!”

The both of you yelp from the surprise, your hands flailing out to brace yourself for the fall.

Fortunately, you land on him when you reach the bottom of the tub, courtesy of him grabbing onto you last second so that he can soften the blow upon impact.

Unfortunately, the breath is knocked out of him from the startle and from the sudden added weight of you on top of him with no warning.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” he groans.

“In hindsight,” You wince as you shift your weight above him, “maybe having sex in the shower again wasn’t the greatest idea. Remember last time when we knocked the shower curtain down and I had to get stitches on my elbow? It’s why we got the glass door installed, and then we had to lie to Tae about it.”

“Ugh, don’t remind me.” He tilts his head back, rubbing a hand over his face. Then, he flashes you an all too charming smirk. “Was kinda worth it though.”

You giggle, sounding so sweet and angelic, even despite the way his cum still leaks from you. Somewhere in the fall, his dick had slipped from you and now lays softening on his stomach which, really, is probably the worst part of the accident to him. He already misses the warmth of you wrapped around him, your mingling cum a dirty mess around him. You prop yourself up on his chest with your palms, but before you can even think to respond, you notice something out of the corner of your eye.

A small mass of fur in the shape of little Yeontan has just poked his head through the crack in the door, oblivious to you and Jungkook’s compromising position. And then, shortly following behind him, is his equally oblivious owner who must have forgotten something in the apartment to bring him back so suddenly.

“Tannie, get back here━ We gotta go━ Oh, Jesus, what the fuck?” Taehyung appears at the door for a millisecond before noticing the situation he’s just stumbled upon. Thankfully, he acts fast, and clamps a hand over his tainted eyes, clumsily scooping up Yeontan in his other hand. “Can you guys please stop fucking all over this damn apartment? My son’s eyes are too pure for this!”

And then he’s retreating, but not before bumping blindly into the doorframe, grumbling along the way. It’s silent for a moment as you and Jungkook gawk at one another; then you hear Taehyung leave the apartment once more, and the both of you dissolve into a fit of unabashed laughter.

“Are you okay?” You ask once you’ve calmed down enough as he reaches out to shut the shower off. You plant a kiss in your boyfriend’s hair. “You hit your head coming down.”

Jungkook’s heart swells at your gentle touches and smiles. “I’m fine,” he promises brightly. “You?”

“Well, you did just thoroughly fuck me, so━” You shrug innocently. “I’m kinda still too giddy to even care.”

“I’m gonna make it up to you,” he says. “For almost giving you a heart attack with my hair and for almost putting you in the emergency room again just now.”

The mention of his hair draws your attention to it once more. It’s not as wet as before, damp azure waves falling into his eyes that you brush away gingerly.

“Yeah,” You snort, “but I’ve decided I like your hair. Like, really like it.”

“Yeah?” he grins wide. “What was the deciding factor?”

You pause, as if to think for a moment. Exhaustion riddles your body and you know sleeping curled up next to Jungkook is nearing your future, but for now you let yourself entertain the last remnants of whatever lewd thoughts are still on yours and his minds before they fizzle away completely. You can’t help yourself anyway. The blue really is nice.

“Definitely the view of you eating me out,” You say. “And can’t forget how pretty it looks when I’m pulling at your hair.”

“Say no more,” he beams. “Then I’ll make it up to you by making you cum on my tongue again and again and again.”

The last thing he hears before he grabs at your cheek to softly pull you down to him for one last kiss, slow and ardent, is a bubbly giggle from you that delights him to no end.

“That’s a good boy.”

⟶ All rights reserved to © jungkxook. I do not allow reposting, translating, or any sort of modifying and reuploading of my work.

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#btsbookclub #bangtanhq #btscreatorscorner #jungkook #jungkook smut #jungkook fluff #jungkook x reader #jungkook x you #jungkook x y/n #bts #bts smut #bts scenarios #jungkook scenarios #bts fluff #jungkook imagine #jeongguk smut #jeon jeongguk smut #jeon jeongguk fluff #jeon jungkook smut #bangtan smut #bangtan #bts fanfic #bts oneshots #FINALLY POSTED SOMETHING YEEHAW #was gonna call this 'blue is sus' like among us but thankfully decided against it

[gukyi]

the love project | jjk

summary: from running to mcdonald’s at 3am after a halloween party where the two of you dressed up as the teletubbies to timing how long it takes for him to drink a cup of monster mixed with mountain dew and iced coffee and then do fifty push-ups, you’re used to your best friend jungkook asking you to do all sorts of crazy things. but, of all the shit the two of you do, letting him follow you around for a week with a camera and take candid photos of you for a photography assignment might just be the craziest of them all.

{college!au, friends to lovers!au}

pairing: jeon jungkook x female reader genre: fluff, comedy word count: 12k warnings: college antics, hopeless pining, slow burn a/n: me: this fic will be 10k max! also me: actually nevermind on par for the course of this blog, i hope you enjoy this fic! it was so much fun to write and it definitely got me back into the ~writing mood~. more fics coming soon!

These days, the weeks pass you by like trains on a platform. They whiz past you, the only discernible features being the beginning and the end of them, with the middle nothing but a blur. 

At least, that’s how it feels when you’re in college, and the days bleed into weeks bleed into months, and suddenly you’re one year closer to graduating, one year closer to figuring out what next to do with your life, even if you’re still missing that one general education requirement you forgot to take in your first year so now you’re trying to cram it into your schedule at the last minute.

Okay, you’ll admit it. Introduction to Astronomy is kicking your ass. That’s what you get for putting it off until junior year, when you’re supposed to have reached the point in your History major career where you don’t have to look at numbers anymore and the idea of doing basic math is absolutely unfathomable. History majors don’t do math. They just don’t. It vanished from your academic arsenal long before now, alongside your ability to interpret word problems and understand science textbooks. 

Perhaps in another universe, you would have actually retained those skills past high school, but that universe is not this one, and so your problem sets can solve themselves or not be solved at all. 

Your best friend would have to disagree.

“It’s not even calculus!” Jungkook exclaims over a mouthful of a Starbucks tomato and pesto panini, pointing to your laptop in exasperation, as if the answer has been staring you in the face for the past fifteen minutes. “It’s just algebra! All you’re doing is plugging the numbers into the formula and finding the missing variable!”

“Easy for you to say,” you huff, furiously erasing at the notebook in front of you as you get yet another incorrect answer. Who knew math could be so difficult? Oh, that’s right. You did. “You took that advanced differential equations class for fun last year. It’s not even required for your major. You’re just a masochist.”

“Says the person who convinced their advisor to let them take seven classes because they, and I quote, ‘all seemed so interesting’ and you ‘didn’t want to miss out.’” Jungkook rebukes pointedly. “Because your life would be so terrible if you didn’t take Economic History of Pre-Industrialized Europe.”

He’s got you there. Seven classes is a lot. In your defense, Economic History of Pre-Industrialized Europe was very interesting and you got a 4.0 that semester. So who is he to judge? Jungkook’s favorite pastime is pretending that taking three different computer science classes in a single semester isn’t going to single-handedly kill him.

Jungkook watches you struggle for a few moments more before he sighs, like he can’t take looking at someone so mathematically incompetent any longer. He stuffs the remaining third of his Starbucks panini into his mouth all at once like the ravenous beast he is before he reaches over the tiny table you’re sat at to look at your problem set himself. He turns your laptop towards him and grabs hold of your notebook, furrowing his eyebrows as he enters Work Jungkook Mode. 

Work Jungkook Mode is the mode of him you see most often during finals week or the rare occasions where you meet up to actually try and get work done. Work Jungkook has tunnel vision for whatever assignment is currently in front of him, which he will do either in one sitting or die trying. Work Jungkook lets his coffee get cold and forgets to answer your text messages, even when you’re sat right across from him and you know that he can see the notification on his laptop. Work Jungkook refuses to turn in anything that he hasn’t devoted his entire being to, even if it’s something as simple as a discussion board post. Some of his other friends say that when Jungkook is in Work Jungkook Mode, they won’t even try to contact him, lest their messages get lost in the flurry of his coding assignments. 

But you are not “some of his other friends.” You are his best friend. So rules do not apply to you. And Jungkook has long accepted that fact.

“Hey, don’t mess up my work—” You exclaim defensively, grabby hands reaching over the table to retrieve your notebook. “Wait, how did you do that?”

Jungkook scribbles something down in nearly-illegible font, determined to solve the problem in front of him. He thinks for a few more seconds before eventually jotting down an answer, circling it with his pencil. Holding the notebook out so both of you can see, he scoots his chair over to your side of the table, your shoulders pressed together in this tiny corner of the Starbucks, right by the bathroom, and explains, step by step, what he did. 

He does that for the following two problems in your set, walking you through the kind of math he was doing in freshman year of high school like it’s nothing, answering all of your stupid questions and giving you tips on how to finesse the system by taking as many shortcuts as possible. Teaching you things you never learned, or possibly had just forgotten. Things that a professor would think is idiotic to re-teach to a junior in university. Things that Jungkook wants you to know because he just wants you to have a little more faith in yourself. 

“Does that help?” He asks when he’s finished, still doubting his fantastic teaching abilities despite the fact that he just taught you more in the last thirty minutes than your professor has managed in a month and a half. 

“It actually does,” you tell him, pleasantly surprised. Looking back down at your notebook, what was once a shapeless blur of numbers, letters, and formulas is suddenly a clear and organized outline of each and every step to follow. “I didn’t know it was that easy.”

“Anything can be easy if you just commit yourself to learning how to do it,” Jungkook says, one of those random sentences that are too wise for a college student surviving off of RedBull and Starbucks food, the ones that always make you think Jungkook is secretly an immortal sage with life experiences far beyond your own. “Except coding. Which is hard no matter how good you are at it.”

“Aw, you can do it,” you rally, reaching up to pinch his chin in between your fingers and squeeze it tight. “It’s also too late to change your major now, so you’re stuck.”

“Wow, thanks for the encouragement,” Jungkook chides, hand coming up to rub at where you held his jaw, rolling his eyes. “You should let me help you with your Astronomy work more often. Gives me a break from Python.”

“I would have made you help me whether you liked it or not,” you tell him pointedly, because he is your best friend and he doesn’t get out of things as easily as he thinks he can. “But thanks. I’ll definitely take you up on that.”

“Of course,” Jungkook says with a good-natured grin, always so selfless and kind and giving. He practically signed himself up for a semester’s worth of TA-ing for Introduction to Astronomy despite the constant mountain of work he has himself. Just because it’s you. 

“My very own personal genius,” you muse, wrapping your hands around his arm and snuggling into his body, a whisper of a language only the two of you share. It’s something the two of you have long gotten used to, pressing your fingers all over each other’s bodies like it’s second nature. One of the things that makes you feel so certain about having Jungkook in your life. About wanting him to stay with you for the rest of time. “I’m never letting you go.”

Jungkook smiles, a warm hand coming to rest atop of your own. He breathes, in and out, chest rising beneath your touch. “Like I’d ever let you,” he says.

There is no question about it. Jungkook is one hundred percent, absolutely, undoubtedly, positively, indisputably smarter than you are. It’s something that the two of you used to jokingly fight about (because Jungkook claims that he’s a bad essay writer, even though he’s not), but at this point it’s cemented in stone—he’s a damn genius. A genius who is inexplicably good at everything. A double threat. Triple, if you count the fact that he’s built beyond belief and could probably chuck you into next week if you really, really ticked him off. 

The truth is that, ninety percent of the time it is you who is going to Jungkook for help. Whether it be an assignment you need assistance on (namely Astronomy, because Jungkook probably couldn’t help you on your Mesopotamian artifact and primary source analyses despite his best intentions), a date that was a lot worse than you were hoping it would be, or even just the right coffee to order from that expensive place on the corner. Jungkook knows how to fix everything. 

So when Jungkook slides into the seat across from you in the food court after his Mastering Photography class with that I’m in trouble look on his face, you know something is horribly wrong. 

“Are you alright?” You ask, concerned as you watch him devour the sushi takeout in front of him, stuffing the spicy tuna rolls into his mouth like they’re Skittles. His camera hangs haphazardly out of his open backpack, like he barely had enough time to stuff it into the pocket while he was making his way here. There’s a worried expression written all over his face as he fumbles with the chopsticks in his hand, losing his grip on them every ten seconds. 

It’s not until Jungkook has finished the container of spicy tuna rolls in front of them that he finally seems to work up the courage to answer you. 

“My Photography class is gonna be the death of me,” Jungkook exclaims, exasperated. 

“I thought you liked it,” you comment unhelpfully. Jungkook had been so excited to be enrolled in it, because you needed a recommendation from a different professor and you had to submit a portfolio in order to join the class, making it one of those exclusive (and thus, much better) courses. Not to mention the fact that Jungkook is basically already a professional photographer if his Instagram is anything to go by. He’s going to walk out of university with a Photography minor whether he realizes it or not.

“I do,” Jungkook insists, even if right now it sounds like the two of you both need convincing of that fact. “But this project is ridiculous. I don’t even know how my professor expects us to have the time to finish it.”

“What do you have to do?”

Jungkook sighs. Just thinking about it seems to stress him out. “I mean, it’s only really a week long. So I guess it’s not too bad. But we’re supposed to compile a portfolio of the same subject, taken over the course of the week, with them in all sorts of different poses and lighting and locations, to express a personal theme.”

You scrunch your nose up in confusion. “I might be wrong, but isn’t that what photography… is?” You ask cluelessly. 

“Yes,” Jungkook argues, “but also no. Photography is taking pictures of things just for the hell of it. Not because they necessarily speak to a part of your soul. You just like the look of it. You want to capture the scene. That’s it.”

“Oh,” You say dumbly. 

“And our subject can be whoever or whatever we want, but he recommended choosing a person because taking pictures of our water bottles in different places is boring,” Jungkook huffs, though his professor does have a point there. Modern history wasn’t made out of photographs of store windows and miscellaneous items. It was made out of people, out of events in their lives that shaped the rest of the world, out of personal experiences that changed their point of view. “But I don’t even know anybody who would be willing to let me photograph them for a whole week! I’d basically have to follow them around like paparazzi!”

“I’ll do it,” you suggest casually, because it seems like the most obvious choice to you. There’s no one Jungkook spends as much time with as you. 

Jungkook’s eyes pop out of his head. “What?”

“I’m serious,” you insist. “Think about it. You need a subject for your project that you can photograph in a wide variety of places and over the course of a week. Who else do you spend that much time with, other than me?”

“Well..” Jungkook begins, trying to fight your reasons with his own. “Would you even be comfortable with something like that? I mean, I’m literally going to constantly be taking photos of you.”

“Like we don’t already do that on our phones,” you tease, having amassed quite the album of terrible Jungkook pictures over the years. 

“A camera is different from a phone,” Jungkook protests weakly. 

“Yeah, yeah, I know. But I’m just saying. It won’t bother me,” you say with a shrug. Why is Jungkook being so… weird about your suggestion? You thought he would be jumping at the offer, especially considering it means he won’t have to go out of his way to find and photograph someone else for this assignment. But he’s being rather hesitant. You watch as he glares down at his empty sushi takeout box, eyebrows furrowed in that thick, nervous way. “But you don’t have to,” you backtrack. “It was just a suggestion.”

He breathes in and breathes out, expression solid. Even from here you can see the cogs whirring in his brain, placing each and every potential result into a pro and con list inside his mind, trying to work out whether the benefits will be greater than the cost. 

Quite frankly, you don’t know what all the holdup is about. 

“You’re… sure about this?” He asks, looking up at you, determined to ensure your comfort. As if that’s even an issue. “You’re cool with being photographed and everything?”

“Only because it’s you,” you tease lightheartedly, expecting some sort of equally cheesy response. Instead, it makes Jungkook do something weird. He freezes in place, darting his eyes away from your gaze for a split second, collecting thoughts you can’t see. “Yeah,” you say loudly, trying to bring him back. “I’m fine with it.”

He inhales, exhales, closes his eyes, and opens them. “Okay then. I guess it’s settled. You’ll be my subject,” he declares, an almost unnoticeable wobble to his voice. It’s probably nothing, so you don’t think too hard about it.

“Can you at least pretend to be a little more excited about this?” You ask, jabbing him in the chest with a wooden chopstick. “It’s the first time we’ve ever gotten to be part of a project together!”

“Yay,” Jungkook says, lifeless. 

“How about a photo to commemorate it?” You suggest, reaching over to pull the camera out of his backpack, pushing it into his hands. “This can be the start of your portfolio.”

“Fine,” he eventually caves, bringing it up to his eye as he turns it on, twisting the lens to perfect the focus. Even caught off guard like this, he looks like a professional, like someone who was born to be behind the camera. He’s a computer science major but you know that photography will always be something special to him.

You strike a dramatic pose, holding your chopsticks out, one in each hand, with a wide, excited smile on your face. “How do I look?” You ask, scrunching your eyes together. 

Jungkook’s finger hovers over the silver button. “Perfect,” he tells you, voice soft and honest. 

Click.

“So, how many photos are you supposed to take for this portfolio?” You ask as you flop around on Jungkook’s bed, pretending that the open tab on your laptop with your fifty-page reading doesn’t exist. You don’t even know why professors assign readings that long. Do they really expect you to read all of it?

From across his room, you can make out the top of Jungkook’s fluffy brown hair over his sleek gaming chair, one of the ones that look like high-tech airplane seats. “I don’t know,” he says. “He said at least twenty. And no more than fifty. Which really makes me wonder if someone once submitted like, one hundred photos for this project that he had to grade them on. But yeah.”

“That doesn’t sound too bad,” you say. When you’re around a cute animal, you can easily take twenty photographs. Granted, they aren’t exactly award-worthy photographs, but it’s not a physically demanding task. 

“Yeah,” Jungkook says. “Hypothetically you could finish it in a day. But it looks really obvious.”

“Well, how many do you have now?”

It’s been a day and a half since Jungkook agreed to let you be his so-called muse, but already you’ve lost track of how many photos he’s taken of you. He loves his camera, you know that, but you didn’t realize exactly how much he loves his camera. And with you as the sole subject for his project, he’s practically letting it hang from his neck all day long, just waiting for the right time to snap a photo of you standing in line at the food court, frowning at your textbook, or waiting to meet up with him. Every time he sees you he snaps a picture, even if the lighting’s bad, even if you haven’t had your morning coffee yet, even if it’s midnight and you look like a zombie. In his mind, there are no bad pictures. Just memories.

You wonder what the hell he sees in you. 

“A lot,” Jungkook answers unhelpfully, making no effort to elaborate on that statement. 

“Have you counted?” You ask, getting off of his bed to join him at his desk. 

Jungkook doesn’t seem to realize what you’re doing until you’re standing right next to him, placing a hand over his shoulders as you lean down next to him. He fumbles around for a second, the mouse slipping through his grip, and you catch a glimpse of one of the photos he’s taken of you, a sliver of your pursed lips, the wrinkles between your eyebrows. 

It’s from the library yesterday. You didn’t even know Jungkook had taken a picture of you there. You had a stupid reading to complete last night, one that made no sense and was terribly-written, and you spent an hour just trying to figure out what the damn argument was, and Jungkook captured it. You were there for an hour and Jungkook was there too, watching you like it was nothing, waiting for the perfect moment. He was there, sitting across from you, camera at the ready. You didn’t even hear it click. 

He closes it before you get a closer look at the photo, frantically hitting the little red dot at the top corner of the window before you have a chance to ask why. 

“What, I’m not allowed to see?” You chide, a little bit hurt but more confused than anything else. Why is Jungkook being so secretive?

“No,” Jungkook spits quickly. making you raise an eyebrow in alarm. “I mean, it’s a surprise. You get to see when it’s finished. I still have to… uh, edit. And stuff.”

“Edit? You think I’m that ugly?” You tease, knowing that he probably means color correction but enjoying the way that he gets all flustered when he hears your voice.

Jungkook’s eyes widen at that, like he just realized he made a wrong turn and is desperately backtracking. “What, no! I don’t—I don’t think you’re ugly.”

You laugh, letting the sound of your voice ease the tension in his shoulders, reveling in the way his big doe eyes seem to soften when he realizes you were just teasing. He looks like a kid caught stealing a candy bar from a gas station, looks like one of those boyfriends in the viral videos where the girl reveals that she got him a present or something instead, all nervous and full of explanations. 

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding,” you assure him, rubbing up and down his arm to soothe him, calm his heart down. “You don’t have to show me. I’m just excited. No one’s ever taken photos of me like this before.”

“I would,” Jungkook speaks up softly. “If you asked. I would.”

“I know,” You say. You’re not sure if there’s a thing in this world Jungkook wouldn’t do for you, and you, him. If he asked, you would pluck the stars from the sky for him. Bring him back a piece of the moon. Stop time. Anything. Everything. Just for him. “I know.”

 “What are you doing?” Jungkook asks, changing the topic as he whirls around in his gaming chair. 

“Just another reading, like always,” you dismiss, because you’re positive the last thing Jungkook wants to hear about right now is your primary source reading on irrigation techniques in agrarian Europe. You don’t even want to hear about it. “But I could use some help on Astronomy.”

Without another word, Jungkook gets up from his desk and the two of you head over to his bed, where an untouched problem set waits on your computer. He grabs a notebook from his backpack along the way before sitting down next to you on the edge of his bed, bodies pressed together. Slowly, he begins to coach you through each problem, step by step, drawing pictures and diagrams if he has to, until you finish all ten problems. 

The truth is, you didn’t really need help with this unit. Astronomy’s gotten a lot easier now that Jungkook has taught you the strategies to tackle it. But Jungkook sometimes feels like a ghost when he works, especially when he’s sitting at his desk, quiet and focused and almost invisible. And call you clingy, but you like it when you can look up and see his face instead of the back of a chair, a little tuft of wavy brown hair. You like it when he’s right beside you, in a place where you know you won’t lose him, where you can hold on if things get rough. Where you can see his stupid brown eyes and his goofy smile and know that he’ll always be there for you. 

When he’s finished, Jungkook doesn’t get back up to sit at his desk. He flops down on his back, staring up at the white ceiling of his room, eyes tracing the cracks. You join him, side by side, pretending that there’s something there. Looking up at the sky would be nicer, but it doesn’t really matter, so long as you’re with him.

“I didn’t know you took so many photos,” you say.

“I never want to miss anything.”

“You should give me more warnings, next time. I feel like I look so ugly in some of them.”

“No, you don’t. Don’t say stuff like that.”

“You don’t think I’m ugly?” You ask him, for real this time. It’s not that you think he’s going to say that he does, it’s that you want to know what he really thinks. How he really sees you. You turn your head to him, back pressed against his comforter, barely a foot apart. And he turns back to you, and he’s right there, right there in front of you, big brown eyes wide and blinking. He’s right there, how could you miss him?

“No,” Jungkook says, honest and true. He looks at you, looks right at you, right into you, and he muses to himself, chuckling. “Why would I ever think that?”

At the end of the day, you can’t really be bothered to put on real pants in anticipation of Jungkook’s trigger-happy camera-taking tendencies. He’s seen you spill a boiling hot bowl of tomato soup all over yourself in the dining hall. He’s seen you at four in the morning in the library the night before finals begin, eyebags down to your knees and mismatched shoes on your feet. He’s seen you in the middle of a frat house, sweat dripping down your forehead and smelling of nothing but straight alcohol. Getting dressed up just for him would be antithetical to the very foundation of your friendship. 

You have, however, become keenly more cognizant in the last few days of when Jungkook is about to take a photo of you. Mostly because you glance up at your surroundings every three seconds to make sure you aren’t getting sniped from across the food court. Nobody else needs to see a picture of you picking up three pieces of sushi with your chopsticks and stuffing them all into your mouth at once. And, from what you can tell, you’ve been pretty successful, which either means you’ve gotten better at telling when Jungkook might be taking a photo of you, or Jungkook’s gotten better at hiding it. 

Either way, he’s got a lot more pictures of you reflexively flashing a peace-sign in his direction when you hear the telltale sound of his camera lens focusing, so you’re not really sure what that means for the fate of his portfolio. 

Besides your newfound hyper-awareness of the sound of a camera lens adjusting, the strangest part of you and Jungkook’s little project is how quickly the rest of your friends adjusted to this brand new dynamic. 

This is not to say this assignment is the weirdest thing you and Jungkook have done together, because there was once one week where you and Jungkook challenged each other to only eat bananas for every meal to see if anything would happen to either of you. Nothing did, but after that week you swore off bananas for the rest of your life and have had little appetite for them since. 

It’s more that your other friends have just accepted the fact that ridiculous, extravagant shenanigans are a necessary part of you and Jungkook’s relationship and have simply chosen not to question them anymore. At least, most of them have. 

“So, how’s you and Jungkook’s little photography fling going?” Maisie asks, and even through the phone you can hear the way she’s wiggling her eyebrows. 

“It’s not a fling, and it’s fine,” you hiss back, trying to keep your voice down as you pack up your belongings, phone pressed between your ear and your shoulder. “Stop speaking so loudly, everyone else in the library can probably hear you.”

“Good, because they’ve all probably noticed the way Jungkook’s been following you around like an unrestrained fanboy for the past four days taking pictures of you,” Maisie says pointedly, voice so sharp it causes you to look around at the other tables to make sure no one’s listening in. 

You frown, hoping your deadpan expression is audible through the phone. “It’s not like that and you know it.”

“Don’t you think it’s even a little strange that you’ve given Jungkook full permission to take photos of you like you’re a model and he’s some sort of weird, professional paparazzi?” You can practically see Maisie’s face in front of you, all wide eyes and raised eyebrows as she makes her point.

“No, it’s what we agreed on,” you remind her for the umpteenth time. There’s nothing weird about this. You’re helping him with a project, what more could it be? “Jungkook needed someone to take pictures of for his photography project and I thought it would be a good idea if I was that someone.”

“Hmm… wonder why…” Maisie trails off, deliberately vague and suggestive all at once. 

“You’ve been going on about this ever since Jungkook and I met, Maise,” you say with a roll of your eyes, tossing your backpack over your shoulder. “You know that Jungkook and I are just friends. Like we have always been.”

“Friends that take candid photos of each other under the guise of a project,” Maisie adds, and you can see the air quotes around the word “project” right in front of you.

“Friends that help each other out because that’s what friends do,” you correct. “You’re just going to have to accept the fact that Jungkook and I are always going to be just friends and nothing more. No matter how much money you’ve bet on us getting together.”

Maisie gasps. “I have not bet money on such a thing! This is slander!”

“Don’t think I don’t see you and Jimin’s damn Venmo history.” You pull up to the front desk of the library to check out a primary source book needed for one of your classes. It’s the first edition, and it’s battered beyond belief, but it’s better than paying for it. “Just this, thanks.”

“The only way you could convince me that you and Jungkook are just friends is if you go on a date or something,” Maisie comments snidely. “I don’t think I’ve seen either of you romantically interested in someone else the entire time you’ve known each other. Isn’t that proof enough?”

“You want me to go on a date with someone?” You demand, determined to get Maisie to hop off your ass about this. 

You and Jungkook are just friends. If swiping right with someone on Tinder and getting dinner and a movie with them is what will convince Maisie of that, then that is what you will do. It’s not as if being friends with Jungkook is mutually exclusive with you going out with other people. Should be easy, right? 

The boy behind the counter tells you your book is due back at the end of the semester, and you nod your thanks before heading out of the library.

“Fine, I’ll go on a date with someone. If it’ll get you to stop trying to convince me that Jungkook and I are gonna get married and have babies,” you declare, pushing your body against the door handles as you leave, five minutes to spare before your next class begins. 

“You guys would have really cute babies, I’m just saying,” Maisie points out like it’s nothing. 

You roll your eyes, taking the phone away from your ear as your finger hovers over the red button. “See you, Maise.”

You’re barely three steps out of the library, still rolling your eyes at the Call Ended screen on your phone when a voice catches your attention. 

“Y/N!”

You turn your head just in time to see Jungkook’s devilish grin disappear behind his camera, and you don’t even have time to blink before he begins snapping away, finger mashing the silver button at the top as your expression morphs from surprise to defeat, unable to counter his sniping abilities with a signature peace sign. Even from twenty feet away, you can hear Jungkook laughing as you take the opportunity to pose for a few moments, like you really are a model and he really is your personal photographer. The sound of his giggles fills the air, music to your ears, lingering between you like dandelion wisps, blown by the wind. 

Another voice breaks you from your trance. 

“And here we have our resident celebrity and her paparazzi,” Jimin says, motioning to the two of you as he speaks to an enormous tour group of potential applicants and their parents. Caught in front of them, the heat suddenly rushes to your cheeks as you instinctively cover your face, embarrassed to have been pointed out by Jimin, whose amicable, lovable personality is both a blessing and a curse when it comes to his part-time job as a tour guide. 

The worst part is how some of the parents and students seem to believe him for a second, that you really are famous and that Jungkook really is your photographer, looking at the two of you inquisitively as you shrink beneath their gazes. 

“I’m kidding,” Jimin quickly continues as Jungkook joins you where you stand, laughing at the way you look like a deer caught in headlights. “They’re just some friends of mine who we happened to catch outside the library, which is our next stop. But don’t they look so cute together?”

“Are you guys dating?” One of the students pipes up, asking what no one else dared to. 

Your eyes widen at the notion, wondering if you and Jungkook really are cursed to always be mistaken for a couple when you two have never been, and most likely will never be one. Shaking your head, you force out a laugh, “No, we’re just friends.” Beside you, Jungkook is noticeably silent. You suppose he’s gotten just as sick of explaining as you. 

“Bummer, right?” Jimin asks his group, earning a couple of disappointed nods from innocent high-schoolers that still believe in love. “But I’m working on that, so don’t worry. Anyway, this library will be your main destination for studying, book-reading, and everything in between, and is conveniently located two minutes away from the freshman dorms…”

The conversation finally drawn away from you and Jungkook, you let out a breath you hadn’t even realized you had been holding in. “Weird, right? Even high-schoolers think we’re together.”

Jungkook doesn’t meet your eyes, fiddling with the settings on his camera just to keep his hands busy. The quiet makes you wonder what is going on up inside his head, makes you wonder what it is he’s thinking about, what it is you’re not seeing. Lately, it’s felt like there’s something on Jungkook’s mind you wish he felt comfortable telling you. 

“Hey, you alright?” You ask, giving him a little nudge with your side. “Did I say something wrong?”

“No,” Jungkook says, voice soft, barely audible. It doesn’t make you feel any better. “No, it’s fine. Don’t worry about it. Don’t you have class soon?”

“Oh, shit, you’re right, fuck,” you say, checking your phone only to find you have barely a minute to get to your next class. Guess you’ll be using one of your allotted absences today. “Thanks for reminding me. Dinner tonight?”

“I’ll text you,” Jungkook promises, and you nod your agreement as you dash off, determined to turn a five-minute walk into a one-minute one with the power of exercise. As you leave, you watch as Jungkook flounders outside the library, staring down at his camera and scrolling through his photos, and you still find yourself feeling like you’re missing something. What is Jungkook not telling you? 

What do you not know?

By the time you reach your class, two minutes late and completely out of breath, tardiness is the last thing on your mind.

This project was just meant to be a friend helping out a friend. So why does it feel like you and Jungkook are losing each other?

Using Tinder is easy. Dangerously so.

You’re no expert in app design, but its simplified “yes or no” mechanic has you swiping through people like it’s an extreme sport, barely giving some of them a second glance if their Tinder profile description doesn’t make you laugh within the first sentence. 

Tinder was, admittedly, not your first choice of potential date-finding methods. Call you old-fashioned, but whatever happened to asking someone in person if they wanted to get a meal with you? To showing up at their doorstep with a rose bouquet and a toothy white grin? Perhaps all of those old-timey movies you and Jungkook always watched have given you unrealistic expectations. But can you blame them? 

Even if Tinder wasn’t your first choice, it was certainly the fastest. It takes a second to look at someone’s designated Tinder thumbnail, two to read their description, and three to decide if they’re worth a swipe right. Compare that to actively meeting up with someone, getting their contact information, and then continuing to dance around each other until you finally decide to get dinner together. That’s the sort of thing that could take weeks. Maybe months. And in some cases, years.

Besides, it’s not like you had very many options at your disposal. You don’t trust Maisie to set you up with someone because she’ll probably just choose one of the many boys from her management class and call it a day. Asking someone yourself is absolutely out of the question. And, for some strange, unknown reason, the idea of getting Jungkook to hook you up with one of his friends just doesn’t sit right with you.

So, Tinder it is. And as it turns out, chivalry isn’t dead. It’s just archaic.

An hour into your mindless swiping, you get a message notification. Two hours after that, you’ve got plans with a nice senior boy whom you’ve never met. 

And for the first time in a very long time, there’s something to mark on your calendar for Saturday night.

The little blue block on your Google Calendar tab stares back at you from where your open laptop sits on your desk, the red line that signifies your current time slowly inching towards it as you fumble around in front of your mirror, more dressed up than you have been in weeks. Maisie was right. It’s been so long since you’ve gone out with someone that you’ve completely forgotten what the dress code is for something like this. A dress? Heels? Makeup?

You don’t want to overshoot it, but part of you thinks you will anyway. What if he’s wearing a hoodie and sweats while you look like you’re about to attend the goddamn Academy Awards? Maybe the eyeshadow was a little too much.

You don’t want to overshoot it, but part of you thinks it’s inevitable that you do. The door to your apartment swings open, and you can hear heavy footsteps making their way to your bedroom, that easy gait of his familiar as always.

“Hey, do you think we can just get some take-out and watch a stupid old noir movie, or something? I’ve had a day,” he shouts out, the sigh audible in his voice.

You don’t want to overshoot it, but part of you thinks you definitely have when you turn around to see Jungkook standing right outside your bedroom in the floppiest sweater you’ve ever seen and jeans with holes in the knees, mouth agape as he stares straight at you. It’s impossible not to notice the way his eyes are blown wide at the sight of you, at the way they rake up and down your figure, like he can’t even believe what he’s seeing. It’s impossible not to notice how he seems to flounder at the sight of you.

The only thing that breaks the both of you out of your stupors, frozen in place like two criminals caught red-handed, is the sound of his hulking black backpack thudding to the floor. 

“Whoa.”

“Do you think it’s too much?” You ask, voice wobbly. God, why are you so nervous? It’s just Jungkook. 

“Too much for what?” Jungkook blinks, deliberate and slow, as if he’s determined to make sure his eyes aren’t deceiving him. “Where are you going?”

“I think we’ll have to do a raincheck for the noir movie and takeout,” you say sheepishly, pursing your lips together in fright as you force out a small, tense smile. “I’m… going out. With someone.”

“Like,” Jungkook begins, and even from here you can hear the way he stops himself, hear him breathe out every word, thick on his tongue. “On a date?”

“Yeah.”

It’s a one-syllable word and yet it takes nearly all of your willpower just to say it. Just to confirm what Jungkook’s already thinking. Just to tell him, your best friend, your ride or die, your number one, that you’re going out on a date. 

“Oh.” Jungkook’s voice is lifeless. “Do I know them?”

“No, uh, it’s just some guy I met on Tinder. I don’t know, I just wanted to see what all the hype was about, I guess. And I haven’t really been on a date in a while, so I figured I might just take up the opportunity, so we’re probably just going to go out to a restaurant and maybe go to a club afterwards if we’re still in the mood, and—” You cut yourself off, so nervous that you’ve resorted to your terrible habit of rambling to try and ease the tension. “Why? Do you think it’s too much?”

“You use Tinder?” Jungkook asks instead. It sounds like he’s shocked to hear this. 

“Yeah…” you trail off. “Why?”

Jungkook freezes at the question, but it’s not because it seems like he doesn’t have an answer. It’s because it seems like he does. Only it’s an answer he doesn’t want to share. 

“Nothing, it’s nothing,” he eventually settles on, shaking his head. “You, uh, you look good.”

“You think? I feel like it’s a lot. I don’t know how to dress appropriately for stuff like this anymore,” you ask, palms sweaty as you furiously straighten out the skirt of your dress. “Should I change into pants, or anything?”

“No, no, I think that’s fine,” Jungkook says with an honest smile. “You look nice like this.”

“It’s probably been like, a year since you last saw me in a dress,” you comment mindlessly, turning back to face the mirror as you fiddle with your makeup, finger wiping away a bit of smudged lipstick or a stray bit of mascara. “I miss my sweats. Hey, whoa, wait, what are you doing—?”

You whip around to find Jungkook slowly fishing out the camera from his backpack, hand gripping it tightly as he brandishes it in front of you. 

“I, um, I just wanted to see if I could maybe take a photo of you,” Jungkook says, a small, little grin decorating his features. “Since you’re all dressed up.”

“Seriously?” You ask in disbelief. 

Jungkook nods, holding the camera out in front of him. “Just one.”

He looks so small, standing across your bedroom. He looks so small and delicate and intimate, body curled in on itself ever so slightly as he looks at you, the yellow glow of your ceiling light reflected in his hazelnut eyes, drowning beneath his clothes. He looks like he has never seen a moment more perfect, never seen an opportunity as clear, looks like he thinks that if he blinks he’ll miss it. 

Looks as if a photo will be the only way to remember it. 

And you nod. Because he is your best friend, and who are you to deny him of something so simple? Of a press of a button? It doesn’t feel like a project anymore. It just feels like a memory. 

Jungkook brings the camera to his eye, and you smile at him, soft and gentle and warm. He grins back, focusing the camera lens before snapping away. 

You wonder what he sees. 

(You wonder if it’s as beautiful as what you see.)

“Have fun tonight, okay?” Jungkook asks of you as your Google Calendar notification sounds, letting you know you have approximately two minutes before he’s supposed to pick you up outside your apartment.

You nod. “I will. And if I don’t, then I’ll come over afterwards. And we can watch that stupid noir film.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Jungkook says with a roll of his eyes, a shrug of his shoulders. 

“But I want to. So I will. Okay? I’ll text you,” you promise. “Don’t think I’ll forget about you.”

Jungkook smiles at your little tease, at the way you cup the side of his jaw with your hand as you head towards your front door. 

“Wait, Y/N,” Jungkook sputters out, running after you. He reaches you right as you get to the door, hand grasping the doorknob. You turn to look at him, blinking. “I hope tonight is everything you dreamed of.”

There is something so distinctly sad in his voice. It makes you wonder who has broken his heart. Makes you wonder what you can do to fix it.

“Even if it’s not,” you say to him, taking his hand in your own and squeezing it tight, reminding him that, no matter what, you’re still here. “I know you’ll always be there to take care of me afterwards.”

Your phone buzzes with a message from your date, and you scurry out the door. 

For some reason, there’s a part of you that wishes you never even left. 

The date is okay. Not bad, but nothing to write home about. By the time you finished eating, it was obvious neither of you had any interest in continuing the night elsewhere, whether it be a club or a karaoke bar. He pays for your meal despite your insistence that you can handle the check perfectly fine on your own, thanks you for a nice night, and drops you right back at your apartment. And so goes your one and only Tinder experience, blowing away like a leaf in the wind. 

You look down at your phone. It isn’t even nine o’clock yet. 

[November 7th, 8:48PM]

You: you still game for that movie?

[November 7th, 8:50PM]

Jungkook: you finished your date already?

You: is that a yes or a no

Jungkook: my door is always open, you know that

You: you’re gonna get robbed one day and it’s gonna be by me You: i’m coming over

The walk from your apartment to Jungkook’s is six minutes and thirty seconds on a good day, and seven minutes and fifteen seconds on a bad day, which is usually dependent on if the traffic light over the main road has decided to be extra slow or not. You could walk the damn route in your sleep if you really wanted, having done it so many times in the last year and a half, ever since he moved out of on-campus housing and into his own place.

Tonight, it takes you nearly eight minutes to get to his apartment, but you mostly chalk that up to the heels you’re wearing. If you cared any less about your dignity, you’d probably take them off and walk barefoot like a defeated heroine in a romance movie, shoes dangling from your fingers as they hang low by your side. 

But you aren’t defeated. You didn’t have the world’s most spectacular date, but the night isn’t over just yet. 

Jungkook’s waiting at his front door by the time you arrive. 

“Eight minutes, huh? You’re getting old,” he asks snidely, looking down at the invisible watch on his wrist. 

“Your counting is just off,” you retort easily, falling into that same friendly rhythm, that familiar little beat that the two of you share. You push past him and into his apartment, instantly feeling more at home, shoulders sinking and heartbeat soothing as you soak in the scent of his room, of his home, of him. 

“How’d it go?” Jungkook asks, eyes hopeful as they watch you tug off your heels. They were hardly three inches tall and yet you still want nothing to do with them. 

You shrug. “Eh. It was okay.”

“Just okay?” Jungkook asks, sounding seriously upset for you. Upset that you didn’t have a good night even after you promised him that you would. Upset that it didn’t turn out to be everything you wanted. 

“I don’t know,” you admit, looking over at him, dejected. “It just—I just had this feeling that it wasn’t going to work out.”

Jungkook scowls to himself, eyebrows furrowing like he’s trying to figure out what exactly you mean by that. And the truth is, you’re not sure either. The date was fine, and he was nice, but even when you first met it felt like you weren’t going to get what you wanted from him. Like you were just going on the date to go on the date. Like you already knew that it would mean nothing. 

Jungkook was going to be waiting for you at the end of the night whether it went amazingly well or terribly bad. And knowing that, strangely enough, almost made you want the date to be horrible. Like it would make seeing Jungkook afterwards that much sweeter. 

“Oh,” Jungkook says lamely. “Well, I’m sorry. It seemed like you were really looking forward to it.”

“It’s alright,” you assure him. “Can we just watch this movie now and make fun of how sexist it is? Please?”

To that, Jungkook easily agrees. As he’s queueing up the movie, you raid his closet for a hoodie and sweatpants, desperate to strip yourself of your dress and tights and cozy up in clothes that are much more appropriate for your comfort level. At this point in your friendship, Jungkook doesn’t even question it when he sees you march into his room, fishing through his closet and drawers for your favorite matching set of his, this grey pair that he’s worn so much it still smells like him even after it’s come right out of the wash. 

He only stares back in awe when he sees you emerge from his bedroom wearing them. 

“Ready?” You ask, breaking him from his resolve.

Jungkook blinks wildly from where he’s seated on his dinky old couch, as if to clear his vision. “What? Oh, yeah, I’ve been waiting for you.”

“Then hurry it up, Mister,” you demand, sitting down next to him and curling into his body. It’s instinctual, at this point, wanting to be close to him. To feel the warmth of his body radiate upon your own. To feel his chest beneath the palm of your hands, his arm wrapped around your side. “All good?” You ask, looking up at him. 

Jungkook looks down at you, and you swear, you’ve never seen him more at home. “Always, when I’m with you.”

The movie is predictably good and predictably sexist, but your favorite part by far is when Jungkook reaches around on the coffee table in front of you for his camera, holding it up to his eye and snatching a picture of the television, the film grainy like an old polaroid, faded like an antique photograph. He clicks away at the scene in front of him before turning on you, the lens so close to your face you’re almost certain all he’ll manage to capture is your nose. You laugh, pushing yourself away from him as he snaps, and snaps, and snaps, image after image after image, until his camera battery has died and there’s no more room left on his card. 

“Guess I’ll have to charge this thing, then,” Jungkook sighs as he declares his camera dead, screen black. 

“You aren’t going to include any of those, are you?” You ask, an eyebrow raised. 

Jungkook shrugs. “Why wouldn’t I?”

“Don’t you have enough?” You deadpan, thinking back to the hundreds of photos Jungkook must have taken of you over the past week, and even more that you don’t know about. There’s certainly no shortage of them in his current camera inventory. That’s for sure. 

“Never,” Jungkook says wickedly. He stretches out an open arm, and you don’t have to think twice about falling into it, letting him wrap you up in his hold, curling into his body. 

The black television screen crackles before you, DVD player waiting for Jungkook to turn it off. There’s no need for either of you to look up at each other. Not when you’re strung together like this. Not when you already know exactly where he is. 

“It’s due on Monday, right?” You inquire softly, fatigue slowly overtaking you. 

“Yeah. I’m almost finished, just have to do some curating and editing.”

“I want to see it.”

“What? My project?”

“What else?”

“It’s just a project, it’s not that exciting.”

You pull away from him at that, looking up at him with furrowed brows and scrunched-up nose. “What do you mean ‘it’s not that exciting’? It’s your photography project. You’ve spent a whole week working on it.”

“Yeah, but it’s just you, you know?” Jungkook objects. “Like, you know what you look like. It’s just going to be a bunch of photos of you, like I said it’d be.”

“That’s exactly why I want to see it,” you say like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “You took pictures of me for a whole week. Don’t you want to share them with me?”

“If you really want some of the photos, I’ll send you some, but you don’t need to see the whole portfolio, you know? It’s just for my professor,” Jungkook says stiffly, surprisingly resistant. What’s the big deal? It’s not like there will suddenly be new information about you that you didn’t know before. You want to see what Jungkook has been working tirelessly on this entire week. Where’s the harm in that?

“Why are you getting so hung up on this? It’s just photos,” you say with a frown. 

“Why are you getting so hung up on this?” Jungkook challenges back. 

You sigh, sinking back into him, defeated. Even a little disagreement like that is enough to knock the wind out of the both of you, so you decide not to push it much further. 

“Do you promise to show me eventually?” You ask, hopeful.

Jungkook pauses for a moment, and you almost expect him to say no, considering how protective of his work he’s being. “One day,” he declares. “One day, I will.”

And that’s good enough for you. 

You lose track of how much time passes after that, feeling your eyelids getting heavy as the warmth of his body envelopes you, drowsiness settling in. There’s just something about this moment, right here, right now, that makes you want to fall asleep.

You’re on the verge of slumber when Jungkook’s voice breaks through.

“Why didn’t you think your date would work out?”

“I don’t know,” you respond sleepily, barely even opening your eyes. “It just felt wrong.”

“How do you know what feels right?”

Good question. Perhaps if you had the energy, you’d answer it. But right now, all you can think about is how cozy you feel in Jungkook’s hoodie and sweatpants, how the scent of him surrounds you, that indescribable, boyish aroma that can’t be replicated. Right now, all you can think about is how easily your body molds into his, like two pieces of a puzzle meant to fit together. Right now, all you can think about is him. 

The worst part about each and every week is when it ends. Because the end of one week signifies the beginning of the next, and when you’re in university, the beginning of the next week means a whole new batch of assignments that you have to complete and a whole new batch of due dates to meet. 

So, yeah. The weeks have been blurring together for you lately. But what else could you expect?

Sunday evening, as per usual, finds you right back where you always are: Jungkook’s apartment. 

The two of you have been regularly getting together on Sundays to study, ever since you both realized you work significantly harder when motivated by the other, determined to finish all of your work on time so you can spend the rest of the night fooling around by mixing Monster with as many unhealthy drinks that you can possibly think of. And it’s been working out well for the both of you so far. Jungkook powers through his coding assignments and you whiz through your readings, intent on keeping up to date with your tasks so they don’t all come crashing down on you at the end of the semester. 

Studying with Jungkook has always been easy, largely due to the fact that it’s the one allotted time during your friendship where the both of you deem it best to not speak to each other for the sake of your work. The moment one of you opens your mouth it’s over, so you sit on opposite ends of the room and pretend that the other person isn’t even there. 

Jungkook told you earlier today that he had already finished his photography portfolio, so there would unfortunately be no sneaky glances over his shoulder to see if you can catch a glimpse of one of the pictures. Which is fine by you, you’re just a little embarrassed that Jungkook had told you this outright. Not that you were planning to do exactly that, but you were planning to do exactly that. 

Part of you. more than anything, wants to know why Jungkook won’t just show you himself. Why he’s being so secretive, so protective of his photography project when you both know already exactly what’s in it. For God’s sake, he just spent the entire week taking photos of you non-stop. It’s like not as if any part of this is a mystery to either of you. What more could he have done?

Whatever. You aren’t going to force it if he doesn’t want you to. You suppose that maybe one day, far into the future, he’ll finally decide that the time is right. 

“I’m so fucking tired,” Jungkook declares lifelessly as he gets up from where he’s sitting on your bed, dead inside. “I need a break.”

“Are you going to the kitchen? Can you make me some tea, please?” You ask him, looking up from the laptop on your desk. 

Jungkook nods wordlessly before disappearing out of the room. 

You and Jungkook’s best study practice to maximize productivity is the taking of each other’s cell phones so that the other cannot be tempted to look at it. It’s worked plenty of times before and will probably work plenty of times again, because as they say, out of sight, out of mind. 

Unfortunately, it’s hard to pretend that your phone is out of sight when it’s been buzzing on your bedside table for the past five minutes, and your fingers have been itching to get over there and answer your damn notifications. So, while Jungkook is out of the room, you decide to cheat a little by dashing over there just to see what the heck is going on in the rest of the world. 

As it turns out, nothing much. Just Maisie texting you as she binges yet another television show, giving spoiler-free updates anytime anything remotely dramatic happens. You have a couple of new emails as well. 

The thing that actually catches your attention the most, is Jungkook’s laptop screen. 

There’s just a Word document open on it, but a Word document is a far cry from his usual coding program or Photoshop. Because you can’t help yourself, you peer over to see what he’s written. 

What did you learn about yourself through this assignment? How do you think you’ve changed?

Hard to say that I have. I don’t think I learned something about myself so much as I confirmed what I already knew, cementing it as a real thought in my brain, rather than just a daydream. Nothing changed in the way that my best friend and I interacted, and I can almost confirm that nothing changed in the way that she feels about me, just as nothing changed in the way I feel about her. I guess you could say I learned that I don’t think anything could ever change the way I feel about her. 

What?

Do you think you’ll ever look back on this project, whether it be as a reference or a memory?

Yes. Not as a reference but to remind myself of this very moment in my life—a single week over the course of my life that I felt was worth saving. I imagine that there will come a time, far in the future, where my best friend and I have separated a little bit, found our own lives and created our own families with our own people. And when that happens, I will look back on this project to remind myself of who we used to be. How we used to feel about each other. Maybe, by that point in time, it won’t hurt as much as it does now. 

This feels personal. Maybe you should stop reading. But there’s just one more question left on the page… 

This assignment forced you to create an entire portfolio, from scratch, using a subject you would have to regularly schedule time with. It was demanding. But, that said, would you ever do this again?

Yes. If it meant getting to spend more time with her, take more photos of her, see her smile once more, I would do it a thousand times over. 

“Y/N?”

You hadn’t even heard the kettle whistling. 

“Jungkook,” you say, breathless, caught red-handed. 

“What are you doing?” He asks, placing your steaming cup of tea down on the desk as he stares back at you in horror, in surprise, in worry, in something. Something that gives you this imminent sense of impending doom. 

“Uh—”

“Were you reading my computer screen?”

It’s not like you could say you were doing anything else. 

“I couldn’t help myself, I came over here to check my phone since it’s been buzzing like crazy and your computer was right there and I just…” you sputter out, thoughts swirling inside your head. 

(I will look back on this project to remind myself of who we used to be. How we used to feel about each other. Maybe, by that point in time, it won’t hurt as much as it does now. 

If it meant getting to see her smile once more, I would do it a thousand times over. 

I guess you could say I learned that I don’t think anything could ever change the way I feel about her.)

“What do you mean, how you feel about me?” You ask, because you can’t help yourself. Because the sound of his voices echoes in your head like the beat of a drum, over and over and over. Because you’re staring back at him and even if he just caught you snooping through his computer you can never be worried when it comes to him. Because everything he has ever done puts you at ease. 

“Y/N, that is private, why would you read something like that?” He asks, each word a sucker punch into your heart. 

“Because I just had to know, okay?” You shout back. “I had to know what you were hiding from me.”

“So you decided to snoop through my computer to see if you could figure it out yourself?” He demands, storming over to you. 

“So you are hiding something?”

“That’s not the point, the point is that—”

“What are you not telling me, Jungkook?” You cry out, watching as he approaches you, dark eyes piercing your gaze. “Why won’t you show me your goddamn portfolio? If there’s really nothing to be afraid of, why are you keeping it from me? I’m your best friend, I’m the fucking subject of your project? Don’t I deserve to see it? Why won’t you show me?”

“Because then you’d know!” Jungkook shouts back, leaving deafening silence in his wake. You look up at him, blinking. In front of you, Jungkook is out of breath, chest heaving. 

He looks so strained. So tired. Like he’s been carrying around this secret for months now, maybe even years, and this is the final straw. This is what has sent the both of you crashing down upon each other. This stupid fucking project. You’ve known Jungkook ever since the beginning of your freshman year, and never before have you seen him so hopeless. 

“Jungkook—?”

“You’d know, goddamnit,” Jungkook says, hand coming up to rub at his forehead, dragging down his cheek. “And I wasn’t sure if I was ready for that.”

“Know what? What would I know?” 

Jungkook closes his eyes. Takes a deep breath. Opens them again. “That I’m in love with you.”

The words drift in between the two of you, hovering in the air like feathers. You see them, clear as day, in front of you, hear them echoing in your head, over and over and over again. Feel the way your blood is pumping, the way your heart is beating. 

“You’re in love with me?” You ask him. 

“I didn’t want you to find out this way,” Jungkook admits. “Or at all, really. But I have been, for a while now.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I was afraid that I’d lose you.”

You chuckle, a small, little thing from the back of your throat. “You must have known I’d never let that happen, hmm?”

Jungkook smiles softly. “I was scared. Can you blame me? You’re my best friend.”

“And you are mine,” you remind him. 

“It’s just—” Jungkook begins, like the gates of a dam are opening up. “We’d known each other for so long, and we have such a good thing going as is, always texting and calling and hanging out together, studying together on Sunday nights and seeing each other during the week, and I didn’t want to ruin anything. And then my professor assigned this project, and the only person I could think of to take photos was you, but I didn’t want to ask that of you in case you thought it was weird, but you suggested it anyway so I said yes, but I knew. I knew then that the moment I took one goddamn photo of you it would be obvious, and that if you ever saw you would just know. Stuff like that is easy to pick up in pictures, because a camera is like, tunnel vision for whatever it is you want to focus on most, and that’s you, that’s always been you, so I—”

“Jungkook,” you interrupt, reaching out to him, pressing a soft hand to his cheek. “Just, shut up, okay?”

And then you cup his head in both of your hands, and press a kiss to his lips. A small one, if nothing else, but a kiss nonetheless. You press your lips against his own and immediately you feel the sparks rush through you, this flash of heat that settles into something softer, something sweeter. It ignites and soothes you all at once, like a stray lightning bolt out on the open ocean. Like a single clap of thunder and the pitter patter of rain. 

You press a kiss to his lips and when you pull away, Jungkook’s eyes are closed, lips parted ever so slightly. And for a moment there, you almost think you did the wrong thing. 

But barely a second more passes before he’s scooping you up in his arms and pulling you in close to him, his lips finding yours like it’s the last thing he’ll ever do. He holds you tight, hands pressed against the small of your back as he kisses you, warm and fiery and full, as if he can’t get enough, as if this is his only chance. You gasp into it before relaxing in his hold, cold hands on his warm cheeks, body melting at the feeling of him, of him all over you, of his hands and his mouth and his chest, this perfect, solid figure. 

He kisses you and it sends heat shooting through your body, filling you up from the inside out, like your heart has burst and filled your bloodstream with fire, with sparks of warmth that tingle all over. He kisses you, and everywhere his hands press is another sizzle to your skin, an electric shock that makes you giggle into his mouth. 

He kisses you and it feels like a storm has settled, feels like gentle rain after a hurricane, feels like waves crashing against the shore. He kisses you and it is the only thing you can think about. 

By the time you part once more, you don’t think you’ve ever seen Jungkook so blissed out. 

“See?” You point out softly. “Nothing to be afraid of.”

Jungkook looks positively dazed. “I think I need to lie down.”

“Ooh, was I that good?” You tease.

“I’m dreaming.” He shakes his head. “I’m definitely fucking dreaming.”

Jungkook sinks onto your bed, hitting the mattress with a thud. He stares mindlessly in front of him, like his brain needs time to process. 

You smile to yourself. He can have all the time in the world. 

“Is this real?” He mumbles when you sit down next to him, press another kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Are you real?”

“Just like you,” you promise him. “I didn’t know this is what we had been missing, all this time.”

“It wasn’t missing,” Jungkook assures you. “It was just hidden.”

“I love you,” you whisper, watching him swallow the words like a glass of wine. “I think I always have. You just needed to say it first.”

“Oblivious as always.” Jungkook grins, smiling against your lips. “But I’m glad. If this is what it would take, then I’m glad.”

“You wouldn’t change anything?” You ask him, eyes wide and curious. 

It’s hard to know how long you and Jungkook have been secretly pining over each other. Hard to know how long Jungkook has known that he’s loved you, how long it’s been since you started to feel the same, even if subconsciously. It’s hard to know how long you would have kept going if not for this project. It might have been months. Years. Years that Jungkook was willing to spend holding back, if only it meant keeping you by his side. 

“No,” Jungkook says like it’s the easiest answer in the world. “I have you now. Why would I?”

What did you learn about yourself through this assignment? How do you think you’ve changed?

Previously, I had responded to this question by saying that I hadn’t learned anything, and felt that nothing changed in my life. Then, some things happened. And after those things, I learned that I am the luckiest man alive. To know my best friend is one thing. To love her is a privilege. To have her love me back is nothing less than a miracle.

Do you think you’ll ever look back on this project, whether it be as a reference or a memory?

Yes. Every day for the rest of my life. I don’t think I’ve ever been as thankful to receive a homework assignment as I am, right now. I owe everything to this project. It is the reason I have her. 

This assignment forced you to create an entire portfolio, from scratch, using a subject you would have to regularly schedule time with. It was demanding. But, that said, would you ever do this again?

Yes. I want to take photos of her for the rest of my life. I want to save every memory we ever share together. So that far into the future, we can look back on them together and say, “Remember that?”

↳ links are broken, but don’t forget to message me with any thoughts or feedback!

#jungkook fluff #jungkook angst #bts fluff #bts angst #bts scenario #jungkook scenario #bts imagine #jungkook imagine #bts au #jungkook au #jungkook x reader #bts x reader #w: the love project #yes i am finishing this at 6am on the day its meant to be posted... MIND UR OWN BUSINESS

[ohnominamino]

An Essay on Love in Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time

Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time is a movie about love in all its forms. From the love of family, friends, and neighbors, to the compassion we feel for people we have never met. The movie reminds us that love is something we continuously gain, lose, and choose, again and again. Which love is greatest? In my opinion, the answer to that question is left up to interpretation. In this essay, I will give my own personal interpretation on certain character interactions and what I believe we are meant to take away from their Rebuild portrayals. 

The character I will start with is one I’ve noticed the most outrage over from people who haven’t seen the movie and read out-of-context spoilers: Kaworu Nagisa. 

Kaworu is a beloved character among many Evangelion fans, especially those who are members of the LGBT+ community. He is a canonical love interest of Shinji Ikari and I want to reassure people that this final movie does not change that fact. However, it does not make the couple blatantly endgame either. This skirting around the couple might make some fans upset, and while their feelings are completely valid, I do not think they fully understand the difficulties faced by LGBT+ people in Japan, nor do they understand the way that romance is typically conveyed in Japanese storytelling. (I recommend watching “Is ‘Yuri On Ice’ Good Gay Representation?” by James Somerton for more about storytelling nuances.) 

What have we been shown about Shinji and Kaworu’s love? The good news is, anything you read into the original TV series and End of Evangelion is completely true for the Rebuilds— because Kaworu is the same Kaworu. This movie proves Evangelion is a single universe set on repeat, and that Kaworu and Shinji meet each other every loop, and in each, Kaworu is trying to make Shinji happy. Within the final movie, Shinji becomes aware of the loops and chooses to break the cycle and free Kaworu from his pain. 

What does the relationship between Shinji and Kaworu teach us? I believe the purpose of their love is to show the audience that first, in the words of Kaji, “love has no gender.” Second, I believe Kaworu’s love in particular is a warning about basing your own happiness solely upon another person. There are parallels drawn between Gendo/Yui and Kaworu/Shinji. Gendo could not exist without Yui, and so he was willing to destroy the world to be reunited with her. For Kaworu, it was not the destruction of humanity, but the destruction of himself that defined his tragedy. What’s important within the final movie, in my opinion, is that Shinji does not reject Kaworu’s love. With the insight he’s gained from remembering past loops, he sees Kaworu’s love and appreciates him, but he also sees his suffering and wants to ease it. He helps Kaworu into a new world where he can seek his own happiness and find balance in his life (something his father did not have). 

While Kaworu and Shinji are not seen as an explicit couple at the end of the movie, it’s significant to note that, when he sets Kaworu free, Shinji holds out his hand to Kaworu as a promise to stay together. Over the course of the movie, Shinji comes to accept his connection to others through accepting touch (in the form of hand holding and hugs from Rei, Misato, and Gendo); however, Kaworu is the only character in the movie who Shinji initiates physical contact with and that speaks to how much Kaworu means to him. This simple gesture, in my opinion, keeps the door open for Kaworu and Shinji to be a couple one day, after Kaworu has found more balance in his life. 

If I were to write an entire essay about Kaworu, it would be titled, “Out of the Coffin: How the Resurrection of Kaworu Nagisa Buries the Tragic Lovers Trope” because this movie truly does just that. 

Another potential love interest for Shinji for many years was Asuka; however, unlike with Kaworu, the nature of this relationship is not left up to interpretation by the end of the movie. Before her big final battle, Asuka tells Shinji, “I think I loved you back then” (regarding their time in middle school) and Shinji, during Instrumentality, tells Asuka, “Thank you for saying you loved me. I loved you too.” It is past tense. 

What does this relationship teach us? It’s a beautiful way of showing that we can love people, and grow and learn, and let go when we no longer fit each other. Letting go is an integral part of life. Whereas other Instrumentality scenes involve touch, Asuka’s, mirroring the ending of End of Evangelion, has a distinct lack of touch. Shinji sits with his arms around his knees and Asuka turns her body away from him. He gives her his thanks and he sends her off to find her peace. Asuka and Shinji teach us that it’s okay to grow out of relationships. You can appreciate what they were to you at the time they happened and move on. 

What about Rei? To be honest with you, this movie is less about Rei’s relationship with Shinji, and more about her relationship with the world. Rei teaches movie viewers about the simple pleasures of living. While Shinji is in mourning for the first quarter of the movie, Rei (as “Sokkuri”) is learning about crop growing and community, the wonder of babies and kittens, the joy of the bath after a long day of fruitful work, and the power of words and picture books. At the end of her life, she only regrets not having more time to spend with the people she loves. In Instrumentality, Shinji accepts her hand when it is offered to him, which I hope signifies he is ready to see life as she had come to during the final movie. 

Rei teaches us that we can love living and to not take our limited time for granted. 

Next, we move on to parent figures: Gendo and Misato. I think they both represent people ill suited to the role, who do the best they can despite it. Gendo, as mentioned for Kaworu above, is a warning about defining yourself by your relationship to another person (Ikari, afterall, is Yui’s name). He is also a lesson in how people mourn and how they can lash out. Misato, like Gendo, felt herself a poor parent, and while mourning the loss of Kaji, she gave up her child to be raised by other people, but, unlike Gendo, went forward to put all her energy into protecting humanity. Both of them reach out to hug Shinji within the movie and he accepts them where they are. 

While I wouldn’t say the movie shows that Shinji forgives Gendo, it does show his making an effort to understand and make peace with what others have done. For Misato, it is fair to say we can still hope for a better future, even when it feels like everything is crumbling around us. Her self-sacrificing love for her son and the whole of humanity is what enables Shinji to then save the people he loves (via the spear of Gaius). 

In the movie, we are also shown friendship. Touji, Hikari, and Kensuke are important members of their community who maintain open communication with those around them and respect others’ boundaries. They are patient and kind and represent the importance of being present. They teach us to meet people where they are and support them how we can, whether it’s giving them a warm meal or giving them space when they need it. 

There are many more characters that could be talked about, but today I am going to end on Mari. Mari’s love is physical. She enjoys being in people’s personal bubbles. She cuddles Asuka and helps trim her hair, she gets into Gendo’s space at college, and at the end of the movie, she reaches out her hand to Shinji to help him stand up from his seat. Upon first glance, some viewers might take Mari and Shinji’s final scene to be romantic, but the reality of it is this: We do not, and cannot, know what kind of love she is meant to represent in his life.

We do not know Mari’s relationship with Shinji because they hardly interact in the movie. She clearly cares about him, but in my opinion, it comes from a place of duty and compassion— Mari was friends with Gendo and Yui. She has been there since he was born. (If we take the manga to be canon, then Mari even had romantic feelings towards his mother. Her hairstyle and glasses are from Yui. At the end of the movie, Mari has changed her hairstyle, which to me implies she has moved on, and “getting” with Shinji would be a thematic break.)

Additionally, their conversation, while flirty, is very much one that implies they haven’t seen each other for a while. Mari is someone who is very physically affectionate. With everyone. If someone ignores that and focuses on the fact she gets into Shinji’s space and claims that’s romantic, they better acknowledge it’s possibly romantic with Asuka, who we see far more intimacy with. When Mari flirts, Shinji flirts back and her initial reaction is surprise, “Wow, you’ve learned to talk back!” Her purpose is clear. She is there to remove the DSS choker from his neck. 

Personally, I love that Mari is the one to close the movie, for the exact reason that we do not know her relationship with Shinji. For Mari to have an assigned role would be to say, “This kind of love is most important,” when the entire movie was spent showing us each love is of equal importance in the balance and building of our lives. (It’s wonderful to see those types of love embodied across the platform from Shinji at the end of the movie: Rei and Kaworu, who, just like in End of Evangelion, could signify the ability to connect with others and be loved.)

If you view Mari as a romantic love interest, then I think it speaks to the value that you as an individual give to romance rather than what the characters themselves are feeling. To me, Mari, the character who was created to “destroy Eva,” is a symbol of all love. When Shinji takes her offered hand and then pulls her to run into the new world, it’s a symbol of balance. The give and take of any kind of relationship. 

We are the product of every relationship we have ever had, from our parents to the people we once loved, from our friendships to any other person we want to stay connected to. Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time is a story about these relationships. It is a story about love. 

#rebuild of evangelion #kaworu nagisa #shinji ikari #asuka shikinami #mari makinami #rei ayanami #misato katsuragi #gendo ikari #thrice upon a time #kawoshin #essay #movie review #shinkawo

[cursestothemoon]

hellooooo<3 so, ive always loved the idea of Harry having an older protective sister(he really need one😭) could u pls do a headcanon of how she protects harry and their relationship? annnnddd how she also is dating Fred?? my heart needs it, pls and thank u❤️

i LOVE THIS 

(also i switch from third person pov to second person in the middle of this so im sorry :) but its fine ) 

ok 

i know a common headcanon/ fancanon for harry’s sister is that she looks like lily 

but hear me out 

Y/n Potter who looks exactly like James 

i mean to the T

and Lily would always make little teasing comments about how both her kids look like their dad and james is just :)

anyway

just picture it 

dark brown, wavy hair that was just tussled enough at all times

blue eyes

and the round rimmed glasses that James used to wear

stOP SHE WEARS HER DADS GLASSES BECAUSE WHEN SHE WAS LITTLE SHE’D PULL THEM OFF OF HIM AND AFTER HE DID SHE KEPT THEM AND WHEN SHE MISSES HIM SHE WEARS THEM AND THEY ARE SLIGHTLY TOO BIG AND SIT CROOKED ON HER FACE 

i made myself cry

anyway

lets talk protecting harry first then we will get into dating fred 

so she’s older meaning she’d be in Hogwarts for before him

let’s say she's two years older

George and Fred’s year

and she’d hear the whispers about her 

obviously

and i think she wouldn't tell harry

she would know the story of how their parents died and who harry was to the wizarding community but in an effort to protect Harry’s innocence and childhood for just a little while longer she wouldn’t tell him

at least not until he got to school then she’d be the one to tell him everything 

she is fiercely protective of Harry 

if someone so much as looked at him funny she was chewing their head off 

Harry might’ve been like James 

but Y/n Potter is James 

down to the way her eyes would narrow at someone in class when they made a rude comment 

or she’d try to charm her way out of trouble 

or charm Harry out of trouble

oH MY GOD SHE’D BE IN MCGONAGALL’S CLASS AND ONE OF HER FRIENDS WOULD SAY SOMETHING FUNNY AND SHE’D BE TRYING SO HARD TO HOLD IN HER LAUGH AND SHE’D MAKE THE SAME FACE JAMES WOULD MAKE WHEN TRYING NOT TO LAUGH

Mcgonagall almost cried 

she needed a moment 

ok Y/n would take the first week or so just to show Harry around Hogwarts 

she did not care if she was late

Harry was going to feel comfortable 

oH SHE NEARLY BEAT OLIVER WOOD WITH A BEATER’S BAT WHEN SHE FOUND OUT HE PUT HER TEENY LITTLE BROTHER ON THE QUIDDITCH TEAM AS A SEEKER

she is also part of the team, a chaser

will get spend most of the first few games with Harry making sure he’s ok

yeah malfoy doesn’t stand a chance

never did

10/10 would use the cloak to prank him

all the time

nothing is out of limits 

especially after he’s been nasty to Harry and his friends

growing up harry gets all embarrassed when she protects him because hes 15!1!1! he can handle it 

she is kinda hurt 

very dramatic 

“mY WITTLE BROTHER DOESN’T NEED ME”

“y/n... please”

“nO ITS OK HARRY I GET IT, ILL GO”

“where are you going?”

“YOU DON’T NEED ME ANYMORE, I AM NO LONGER NEEDED HERE”

“you don't HAVE TO LEAVE, WHY ARE YOU LIKE THIS”

Ron was giggling on the couch in the common room he thought this whole scene was hilarious 

ron thinks she is so cool

ok i think she’d also have these little bits of lily that would shine through

unlike harry and james, who could just inhale near a book and get just above average grades

she took pride in studying and being able to sit down and absorb material 

Lily always passed with flying colors because she was a good student who wanted to prove herself 

it was the satisfaction of spending hours studying and being able to retain the information and apply it to earn an amazing grade that she loved

she passed this on to you

as well as her kindness to people who she believed deserved it

and quick wit

you two also had the same hands 

you had everything else from James but your hands looked like your mothers

down to the way your nails grew and fingers held a quill

snape hated it

because he really couldn’t hate you

he was weird around you though

hes just weird

where he'd bully and embarrass Harry 

he couldn’t do that to you because you wouldn’t give him the chance to

you knew the material

you knew the answer 

and he hated how when your hand shot up it looked just like Lily’s 

but you were making the stupid face James would when he’d concentrate 

you did not like snape

at first you were impartial 

then when you heard how rude he was to Harry...

it was also over for him

he didn’t stand a chance 

you had an affinity for pranks, fiercely protective, and you had gall 

your hand writing also looked like Lilys and snape had a rough time grading your essays

tough for him 

:)

also if any rumors went around about harry you were quick to make them actually about you

harry is the heir of slytherin?

actually no Y/n Potter is, there is no evidence but we just heard that it was her somewhere 

you didn’t care as long as no one was being rude to Harry

leTS TALK DEATHLY HALLOWS

so you don’t go with them on the hunt for Horcrux 

and you’d be going insane not knowing how they were or if they were ok

because all your life you had been able to protect to some extent 

but you were completely helpless now

you could do nothing

and then at the battle of hogwarts 

pLEASE

no one stood a chance

the feeling of seeing harry again

beaten, bruised, but still alive 

it was overwhelming

then seeing Hagrid crying in his seemingly dead body

also overwhelming

because you had failed 

you couldn't protect him 

and he heard you scream first 

it was loud and strangled and Harry felt so bad but he knew he had to do this 

I like to think Y/n Potter is the one who killed Voldemort in the end 

you cant argue with me on this sorry

ok

now

lets talk

dating freddie

so he’d probably notice you here and there starting in first year

but he was an eleven year old boy and girls were not on his radar right now

but he thought you were funny and pretty cool 

and your round glasses that were just a little too big for your adolescent face made you look cute 

then you tried out for the quidditch team with him and George 

you were amazing 

not only did you have James natural talent for the sport but that paired with Lily’s tactical thinking and quick mind

you were unstoppable 

you were brought on the team as a seeker 

and you were good at it too, but it wasn’t you’re favorite position

it entailed a lot of waiting and not really moving until you caught sight of the snitch

it was your excellent flying mixed with the fact that you literally had no sense of self preservation that made you a really good seeker

you'd just

nose dive 

if you hit the bottom you hit the bottom oh well 

but when Harry showed up you were happy to give him your position as seeker and take on the more exciting (at least to you) job of chaser

it was your quidditch playing that really got fred’s attention

because you were good 

and during team lunches or team hang outs you were always the life of the party

not because you were avidly trying to be 

but like james, people jus gravitated to your goofiness and happiness 

it was about the middle of fifth year fred realized he had a crush on you

and little man was panicked 

you had noticed fred before that

obviously 

but he was always just the funny guy on the team 

but as everyone knows the potter’s have a thing for gingers 

and it was when they came to pick you and Harry up from the Dursley's just before the quidditch world cup that you saw how attractive he really was 

please its james and lily all over again

kinda 

you become the funniest person in the room when he’s around

always smiley

lilypad?

no.

freddie bug

aH STOP PLEASE THAT’S SO CUTE

YOU’D JUST STARE AT HIM WITH A STUPID SMILE 

it would get to the point you'd be just blatantly flirting 

and fred bluSHES

BECAUSE HE ISN’T USED TO BEING THE ONE ON THE RECEIVING END OF SUCH CLEAR FLIRTING

usually he is the one to pick up girls

he has the charm

likes to make them blush

but yOU CAN JUST LOOK AT HIM WITH A STUPID SMILE AND HES BE ALL GIDDY 

he could barely get a compliment in between your flirting

“Morning Freddie bug, looking cute as always.”

George thinks it both hilarious and disgusting

ron just thinks its disgusting 

but fred is ultimately the one to make the first move to be more than just friends who flirt when the yule ball comes around

he asks you

“Potter! Potter!”

“yes?”

“You, me, Yule ball....”

and as he’s pantomiming it (ya know like in the movie) he also pantomimes a very heavy make out session then what you could assume would be kisses all over your face

it was now your turn to blush as you agreed to go with him

you guys started dating after that :)

pLEASE ONCE HARRY GOT WITH GINNY AND HE SAW A PICTURE OF YOUR PARENTS 

YOUR MOM BEING A RED HEAD AND YOU AND HARRY LOOKING JUST LIKE YOUR DAD

HE WOULD NOT STOP THE JOKES

“i see why you’re with me. it’s my hair isnt it?”

“what? no its no-”

“you probably wouldn’t even look my way if i didn’t have red hair. you potters are unbelievable.”

“you are such a dummy”

“oH AM I? BUT YOU KEEP ME AROUND BECAUSE OF THE HAIR. I SHOULD’VE KNOWN IT WASN’T MY SPARKLING PERSONALITY THAT YOU LOVE.”

taglist:

@amourtentiaa

@siriusement

#Harry Potter #fred weasley imagine #fred weasley x potter!reader #harry potter x sister!reader #harry potter imagine

[roniscloud]

psh - love affair

park sunghoon [f. 8516 words] love affair

so when i’m gonna know what to feel inside, baby?

maybe it’s just all in my head, so

don’t overthink, this is love

maybe it’s just a crush

baby, is this your love affair, your love affair?

synopsis: what happens when two childhood best friends make a deal to help each other’s reputations? an unforeseen circumstance prompts sunghoon to approach you, intriguing not just you but practically every other student at your college. you believe your reunion with him can only end in one of two ways: you resort back to being friends and go on with your lives, or you use each other and once you’re both done, you fall out and never talk again. how will you two navigate your companionship? is it just the nostalgia coming up? a revival of feelings? a new crush? could it possibly be actual love?

genre + tropes : fluff. comedy. the slightest angst. childhoodbestfriends!au. enemiestolovers!au. college!au. fakedating!au. 

warnings: fem reader. a little swearing. slightly suggestive themes, sorta. a few cliches. mentions of underage drinking. the american collegiate school calendar. does them geeking out over fantasy/sci-fi sagas need a warning? unknown mutual pining. they’re so helplessly clueless of their feelings. also appearances of the rest of enha plus txt.

i. prologue

if someone told you that you would reconnect with your childhood best friend—let alone date him, you would’ve laughed in their face and told them to fuck off. park sunghoon is bad news. well, at least to you he is. one of the infamous campus playboys, you can spot him around the quad flirting with a different girl practically every day. 

but to you, he couldn’t have been anymore unlike the sunghoon you grew up with. you grew up with the sunghoon who couldn’t stand being around others, mind always focused on his own interests. you knew him as the little shy boy who would hide behind his mom whenever new people came around. the first person he opened up to was you. you can blame your mom for that. you can vaguely remember her words, something along the lines of mrs. park and i have been friends for longer than you have been alive. when we found out we were both expecting, we knew you two were destined to be besties. 

she was right. everyone thought you were two peas in a pod. wherever one of you went, the other followed. always stuck together, like true partners in crime. your close bond stuck for years. if anyone needed you, you’d most likely be found in the seats of sunghoon’s ice skating practices and competitions, cheering him on and being obnoxiously loud. likewise, he always attended your showcases, spending hours complimenting your artwork.

but then the villain of everyone’s lifetime eventually appeared. puberty. 

alas, your friendship did what anyone could predict of a couple of preteens entering high school. the usual “no matter what we’re gonna stick together!” leading to “sorry for blowing you off, got really busy,” to the imminent “what happened to us? we used to be so close,” and eventually the end of it all. senior year, the two of you attempted to leave on a good note. by that, you mean your parents made both of you apply to the same colleges to have a chance at sticking together. well, it worked, you got into the same university. funny how the universe does things.

back to present day, you’re now in your second year at hybe university. let’s just say, sunghoon isn’t the only one who went through a personality change. sunghoon traded his late night practices on the ice to one-night stands at frat parties. you, on the other hand, traded your once outgoing and fun-loving persona for a more… cold grunge meets artsy introvert. overall, let’s just say you both have reputations for not being the most approachable people. well at least you still have one thing in common.

ii. the cafe

the busy campus cafe was roaring with study groups filling every table. the aroma of fresh coffee and tea being brewed filling the air, creating a warm atmosphere—contrast to the cold winter weather just outside the walls. the college students scattered around, just like their minds scattered as they prepare for finals. not immune to the dreaded time of year, a group of four boys enter, immediately grabbing the attention of those already nestled inside.

a quick roll call of the four known by the student body as en-4, a combination of the dance crew name enhypen and the notorious f4. lee heeseung—the campus heartthrob, captain of the dance crew, center of the basketball team, and an unknown hopeless romantic. park jongseong, although everyone calls him jay—the resident bad boy and party animal, but those close to him know that he’s actually the responsible one. sim jaeyun, otherwise referred to as jake—the friendly and flirty frat boy who you can catch playing soccer in the quad almost every day. finally, park sunghoon—the handsome heartbreaker. he doesn’t need more of an introduction.

the four of them make their way to the counter, placing their orders. of course jake doesn’t miss his chance to sound extra sweet and send a quick wink to the barista, getting elbowed by heeseung in the process. after getting their drinks, they look around to see almost no where to sit. not a single table to fit all of them was available. 

in one of the tucked away areas, sunghoon spots an empty seat at a smaller table. the only catch was there was someone sitting across from it, hunched forward over her laptop. he can’t see much of her figure but he immediately recognizes her features. it’s you. well, a more mature and grown up you, but he couldn’t forget that face for the life of him.

sunghoon’s feet drag himself across the crowded room, catching the attention from the neighboring groups he passed but sneaking away quiet enough to not alarm his own friends. the three are too caught up arguing about what to do. sunghoon can hear the faint voice of jay suggesting going somewhere else while the other two shoot him down as he walks further away. he makes his way all the way up to your side. you look up, scanning him, confused but unamused. “this seat taken?” the first words he said in a year and half to you. still not not giving him any emotion, you hesitantly shake your head once, immediately bringing your focus back to your essay.

ignoring him only works for so long, his gaze not leaving the top of your head. you can feel his stare piercing into you, finally meeting his eyes. “what’s your deal?” the irritation and bluntness in your tone is all too evident.

he shrugs and answers nonchalantly, “nothing, just go along with it.” his answer is hushed, almost as if he’s a bit embarrassed.

“what are you trying to pull here, park?”

“can i not just sit here and peacefully drink my latte? am i that disturbing to you?”

“considering that the second you started walking in this direction, everyone had their eyes on us, then yes, you are that disturbing.”

“they’re not looking at us.” he pauses before continuing with his rant, “they’re looking at you.”

“and why the hell do you think that is?”

“they’re all trying to figure out what could possibly be so interesting about you that i would choose this seat.” he says it like it’s the most obvious answer.

you scoff and turn to see the lingering stares of the others in the cafe. “well, if it isn’t the god park sunghoon being as humble as ever, gracing me with his presence and having mercy on a peasant like me.” the sarcasm dripping off your tongue like venom.

he smiles warmly at your animosity and chuckles. “i’ve always loved your sense of humor.”

“funny cause i’ve always despised yours. i’m gonna ask one more time. what do you want, park?”

he only shrugs. hesitating before responding again, “i like it here. i like talking to you. it’s familiar… comfortable.” he sees your expression change subtly. it’s only for a second before you regain the prior look. he tries to read you. he caught you off guard and his pride brings a smirk to his face. 

by now, he finally tunes back into the situation around him and can feel his phone going off in his jean pocket. he pulls out the phone to see dozens of notifications, quickly stealing a glance back up at you to see that you’re already back to typing away on the previously forgotten assignment. he laughs as he sees the boys blowing up their group chat asking what he was doing. he looks up, finding the three sitting at a cramped booth with shock and confusion written all over them.

“enjoying the attention?” your turn to break the silence. when he turns back to you, you continue, “you’re no stranger to it but you’ve always loved it.” he gives you a slow nod, turning the question back to you. you answer him, “you know that it’s not my forte.”

“and why is that? scared people will get to know the real you?”

“oh please, like you aren’t afraid of me exposing all the dirt i have on you. imagine the buzz i could create with all of your old baby pics.”

he jolts up from his relaxed position, eyebrows raised, and completely on edge, “you wouldn’t dare.”

you lean forward in your seat, elbow resting on the table, cheek resting in your palm, and chuckle, “try me.” the words leaving your mouth quickly and a smile immediately replacing it.

“you’re finally smiling at me. good to know you still have emotions.” he gets you to laugh again. you spend the next 20 minutes catching up. looks like you two kept more in common than you thought. things run smoothly between the two of you, some of your old memories and inside jokes being brought up. “why didn’t this happen sooner?”

“what, us talking? i mean, you and i stopped running in the same crowd and school got the best of us. i will admit, though, freshman year sucked without you.”

he sighs when he hears your admission. “how about this? a proposition. i’m sure you’re aware that i don’t have the best reputation.”

you cut him off, “you can say that again.”

“haha, very funny,” he throws in another sarcastic comment. “you know you’re not exactly the most approachable either. hate to be the one to break it to you but you’re pretty intimidating.” he notices the expression on your face turned into one of annoyance at his last statement, “don’t look at me like that, you know it’s true.”

you dismiss the slight jab, telling him to continue. what you don’t expect is the next four words to come out of his mouth. “go out with me.” he sees your face drop, “oh come on, stop looking at me like that.”

“so i see, a little bit of time without me and you go insane.”

“look, i don’t mean actually date me, i mean… pretend to.”

again, you stare at him like he grew another head. “you want me to fake-date you? what are we, in a k-drama now? sorry hoon, you’re attractive but i would’ve preferred hwang in-youp or song kang.”

now he’s a bit annoyed, answering cockily, “i am so much better looking than them.”

“you wish.”

his jaw drops for a few seconds and then he chuckles. “i’m serious, think about it. we go out and spend time with each other like old times. i don’t look like i’m so incapable of being in a committed relationship and you don’t look like such a loner. no offense.”

“offense taken… but i see your point.”

“see, look at you using that smart brain of yours. this would be no strings attached. just two friends helping each other out while simultaneously deceiving everyone else. i know how much you love tricking others.”

you sit quietly, weighing the pros and cons in your head. “deal.”

iii. bro code

a few days later, sunghoon sits in his shared apartment with the boys, slumped on the couch as they eat dinner. “why are you guys so against it? i thought you wanted to see me in a relationship and now that i’m in one, you guys don’t approve. make it make sense. i should be free to date whoever i want.”

“yeah dude,” pausing to take a bite of his burger, “we get that.” jay answers, seeing how defensive his friend is getting.

jake interejects, “we respect your choices, but like… her? of all the girls that are falling at your feet, you chose her? the one that has no interest in you at all? i know you’re powerful but i don’t get how you managed to pull that off.”

“i feel like you could’ve consulted us about it first. bro code, man.” heeseung says as he shrugs his shoulders and sips on his soda.

“that’s kinda why i like her, because she isn’t all over me like the others. she’s cute and fun to hang out with. just give her a chance. honestly, what’s the worst that could happen? we go out and it doesn’t work. no harm in trying….”

that seems to do the trick as the boys lay off from the topic, going back to their own dinners and watching the latest episode of the penthouse.

later that night, sunghoon leaves their dorm to meet up with you. you agreed earlier that if you needed to meet up and talk that you’d go to the art department. perks of being an art major allows you a studio to spend your time in, secluded from the outside world. in this case, you and sunghoon don’t have to worry about nosy roommates.

when he arrives, he makes sure to take the back entrance like you mentioned. he makes his way through the deserted halls, glancing at each room he passes, and taking note of the various pieces framed along the corridor walls. he gets to the end of the building, finding a studio decorated with your name on the door. he silently enters. you don’t notice him at first with your back against the entrance and the music playing too loud through your airpods, focused on molding the clay on the pottery wheel. he grabs an empty stool, propping it beside you and taking a seat. he takes off one of your airpods, putting it in his own ear.

you finally turn your head towards him, “how long ago did you get here?”

“just now. how long were you waiting?”

you sit up, facing his direction. “i had a couple of classes today and came here to finish some stuff, been here for… what time is it?”

“um… almost 11.”

“then like four hours.”

“you’ve been working on that for four hours? what even is it, and when did you start doing pottery?” he points at the unfinished ceramic.

“not just that. i had some paintings that i needed to finish for my portfolio and those are in a separate room to dry. this,” you refer to the clay, “is just something i’m working on for fun. i got into it cause one of my profs suggested i try another medium.”

he nods along while you explain. “you can keep working on it while we talk.”

you hum in confirmation and turn back to the wheel, rewetting your wands. “so how do we make this believable? seems like people already know. word spreads quick when it comes to you.”

“we just need to act like a couple. so hanging out, going on dates, posting each other here and there, and being affectionate.”

“wow you finally found an excuse to kiss me,” you laugh as you joke with him, him following suit. “sounds reasonable, not much different from how we were as kids, just now we have to call them dates.”

“shouldn’t cause too many problems. just don’t fall in love with me, babe.”

you smile at the new nickname, “likewise, hoon.” you continue throwing the clay, molding it to your desired shape. you hyperfocus on the sculpture, tuning out the boy sitting next to you as he watches—he catches on that you still have the habit of pouting whenever you work on your art. you hunch forward, letting some of your hair fall in front of your face. too caught up, you don’t notice that sunghoon left his seat to stand behind you. he takes your locks and ties it into a messy ponytail. you snap out of your tunnel vision to ask, “why do you just have a hair tie handy?”

“i always had to carry some around for you because you always lost them. i never grew out of it, i guess.” he grins warmly, “do you remember how many times you had complained when you would get paint in your hair and i would have to clean it up for you?”

“how could i forget?” the night ends with more laughs and reminiscing on your childhood. time really does fly faster than you think.

iv. rated pg

the bell rings as you and sunghoon enter the convenience store. you two are discussing the movie you two just watched as you walk through the aisles. 

you split up agreeing to meet back at the register. you make your way to the drinks in the back while sunghoon goes to get snacks. you grab an iced jasmine tea for yourself and an iced vanilla latte for hoon. sunghoon yells over the stands as he browses, “hey, what should i caption for my insta post?”

you respond loudly, “i don’t know, something related to movies.”

sunghoon looks at the picture on his phone: a photo of you two snuggled up in the theater, most of your face hidden in his hoodie. he types in quickly “rated pg for park’s girl <3”, hits post, and goes back to browsing. he goes to grab bento boxes, honey butter chips, candy jellies, and practically everything his eyes landed on. 

when you make it to the cashier, you see sunghoon with his arms full. “you good there, park?”

a muffled “yup” is heard behind all the food.

you look around, walking away when you find what you needed. going closer to him, “why didn’t you just grab a basket?” you start to take some things from his arms, lightening his load. 

“i… uh… didn’t think of it.” he pauses in between, an embarrassed expression adorning his face. you giggle as you take everything to be rung up, missing how his ears turned red. you catch the worker’s name on his tag, jungwon. before you can take out your wallet to pay, sunghoon’s already entering his card into the machine. you whip your head around, ready to tell him off. “nope, do not look at me like that.” you roll your eyes at him as you grab the bag with what you just bought. 

“oh come on… you can’t seriously be mad at me.” no response from you. “really? the silent treatment?” he scoffs jokingly when you cross your arms against your chest. he comes closer to bend down and wrap his arms around your waist. “it’s snacks. it’s not that big of a deal.”

you release yourself from his grasp and walk out of the store, still faking being mad. you mumble, “whatever,” under your beath but still loud enough for him to hear.

he bids jungwon a quick “have a nice night”, not missing him calling the two of you a cute couple. sunghoon meets up with you outside, already sitting on the curb of the parking lot. 

v. pretty boy

the start of a new semester. en-4 are sitting out on the grass of the quad. surrounding them are various groups of students, typical for the buzzing campus on a crisp spring day.

“you need to cook the noodles first. end of discussion.” jake says sternly. he and heeseung are in a heated argument over the proper order of cooking ramen.

heeseung defends himself, “you are so wrong. you make the broth first to build the flavor.”

jay brings his attention up from his phone, “neither of you should be allowed anywhere near a kitchen.”

out of nowhere, a loud car horn is heard, drawing the attention of every student in the area. sunghoon looks up to find you leaning against the passenger door of your car and yelling, “hey, pretty boy! get in.” he chuckles at both the label and how bossy you sound, turning to his friends to grab his things. the three of them are stunned at him.

jake breaks first, “wait, what?”

heeseung lets go of his argument with the australian, “dude, are you seriously leaving?”

sunghoon only nods as he walks away, not letting them ask any more questions. he notices all the watching eyes and decides why not put on a show? he shouts out to you, “thought i was picking you up later, babe.” he makes sure to emphasize the nickname as his infamous smirk tells you exactly what his intentions are.

“lecture ended early, love. prof had some emergency. thought why not surprise you…” you wrap your arms around his shoulders as he reaches you and let him lay a quick peck on your cheek. “now come on, i’m taking you out on a date so either hop in or lose your chance. your choice but i don’t have that much patience so hurry up.”

“yes, ma’am,” he leans in closer and guides his hands lower from your waist. “but i’m driving,” he says as he sneakily takes your keys from your back pocket, 

“you sly fox.” he laughs at the new nickname as he opens the door, letting you sit down before closing it. he makes his way around the hood, noting that all attention is still on you two. he meets eyes with his friends again, the three looking much like the faces he saw in the cafe almost six weeks ago. as he buckles in and starts the car, you rest your hand on top of his on the gear shift. he raises his eyebrows and gives you a charming smile. “by the way, why’s your friend looking at me like that?”

he looks back up to face the boys, “which one?”

“jay. since we started doing this, he keeps looking at me weird—like weirder than the others.”

he tilts his head to the side when he realizes that jay is indeed looking in your direction, but his eyes are focused solely on you. “jay is… how should i put this? you know what i’ll tell you later. for now, tell me where to?”

vi. jukebox

the hazy red glow of the neon lights and checkered tiled floors welcomed you as you led sunghoon into the local diner. this place was a staple in your childhood, your go-to hangout spot with the aforementioned boy when you were still in your youth. 

“i will say, this is a nice surprise.”

you look up to sunghoon as he sits across from you in the vinyl booth seat, “i knew you would love it.” you laugh with each other as you get situated, seeing a young but tall—why is he so tall? he looks like he’s only a teenager—server coming towards your table.

“hey, i’m niki and i’ll be taking care of you guys today,” the giant says cheerfully. “anything i can start you guys with?”

sunghoon looks up at the boy to take your order swiftly, “two strawberry milkshakes, please.” you watch as niki nods and walks back to the counter.

“well, well, well, park… you remembered?” you question teasingly with a cocked eyebrow.

“you’ve always had a sweet tooth. no wonder you loved me so much,” his turn to turn up the typical park sunghoon charm.

you scrunch your face in annoyance, “you should become a comedian.”

“i will never get tired of your sarcasm. it really just… keeps me going.” his way of joking back. “stay here. i’ll be right back,” he says quickly as he looks behind you and gets out of his seat.

you wait patiently for him, assuming he’s just going to the restroom. unbeknownst to you, sunghoon is making his way to the jukebox on the other side of the restaurant. he flips through the song list, finally finding the one he wants. he quickly puts in the coins and sets it in the queue. as he turns to go back to you, he sees an engraving on the side. he runs his fingers along it as he inspects the writing. property of sunghoon and y/n. he thinks back to your last day of eighth grade when you two etched the label onto the wood. he joyfully walks back to your table, ready to let you know about the memory. he sits next to you now, resting his arm behind you and around your back,

“what took you so long, park?”

right as he’s about to explain, niki comes to your table, “two strawberry milkshakes. anything else i can get you two?”

you turn your head quickly to the boy sitting next to you, seeing his eyes are already focused on yours. “um… no, i, uh, think we’re good.” you stumble and stutter a bit. you watch him as he nods his head and walks away. regaining your composure, you ask sunghoon again, “so what did take you so long?”

once again, he gets interrupted. the sound of “purpose” by justin bieber playing over the speakers makes him stop. he gives you a second to register the song, “that’s why.”

you tilt your head down and look at him quizzically, “really? this is why?” you reach to your drink, sipping on the straw as you wait for his answer.

he mirrors your movement, nodding his head in confirmation. he too drinks from the tall glass, contrary to your use of a straw, he opts to drink straight from the rim. he pulls the milkshake away, leaving some on his upper lip.

you burst into quiet laughter, turning your gaze away to not spit out your own shake.

sunghoon furrows his eyebrows in confusion, “what’s so funny?”

you turn back to him, “you got a little something there, park.” you wipe away the liquid from his face with your thumb, popping into your own mouth to clean it up.”there, all good now.”

sunghoon freezes in his spot, trying to comprehend what just happened. it’s quick but he feels something. trying to shake off the foreign feeling, he turns to face forward again. he feels you lean into him, head resting on his chest. a small grin appears on his face, humming along to the justin bieber tune still playing.

“i missed hearing you sing.”

sunghoon looks down at the crown of your head, “really? you used to always tease me about it, though.”

you shake your head with a light laugh, “i never meant it. whenever you sang, it always calmed me. i used to think… if you didn’t pursue skating, you could’ve been a singer.”

“and then what? i would bring you around on tour everywhere and sneak you in backstage?”

“that could’ve been fun.” you now laugh louder than before, him along with you.

there it is again. sunghoon’s not sure what it is, trying to suppress the odd emotion. he sits there, cuddling up to you in the booth, finishing the strawberry milkshakes, just hoping you can’t hear the way his heart starts to beat faster.

sitting at the bar, snacking on fries, and trying to not be seen by you two are heeseung, jay, and jake. they ask themselves would they really be considered sunghoon’s friends if they didn’t follow them and stake out their date.

vii. nerds

sunghoon picked you up from the art department today. he showed up about ten minutes too early, and he got permission from your instructor to monitor your class from the back. he waited outside the door while you cleaned up, earning a few prying looks from your peers as they exited. as you drove back to his place, you agreed to have a movie marathon. 

opening the door to his dorm, you say “we are watching star wars. luke, leia, and han solo are a way better trio than three child magicians.”

sunghoon defends his choice, “first of all, they’re wizards. second, i’m offended. harry, ron, and hermione use magic with their wands. all star wars has is weird weapons and robots.”

“they’re literally in space and excuse you, but does something called—oh, i don’t know—the force ring any bells? they’re jedis, duh.” you rolls your eyes, making your annoyance clear.

sunghoon stops in the hall, “harry potter has spells and potions.”

“star wars has chewbacca.” you stand next to him with your arms crossed.

definitively and matter-of-factly, sunghoon says, “quidditch.”

“you can’t seriously believe quidditch is praiseworthy?” you look at him crazily.

“you two are such nerds.”

you both freeze, turning to see the rest of en-4 sitting in the living room. in the midst of your argument, you both failed to notice the others were home. you realize that jay was the one to stop you two. you also realize it’s the dreaded time for the best friends to finally meet the “girlfriend”. sunghoon seems to realize it as well, reaching to intertwine your hands to both sell the act to his roomates and to calm you down.

he leads you into the living room, meeting eyes with the boys. “so… guys, this is y/n, my girlfriend.”

“it’s so nice to finally meet you! i’m jake. sunghoon here has been holding out on us. i mean, come on, it’s been like two months and he still hasn’t introduced you to us.” the australian continues on with his energetic and positive ramble, asking you questions about your relationship.

heeseung butts in to tell jake to slow down. “i’m heeseung. jake’s right though, you two started dating before winter break and we’re barely meeting you now. sunghoon is always hanging out with you and telling us everything about it. honestly, all i can tell you is to run while you still can.” the others all laugh at his antics.

sunghoon scoffs, “hey, i’m not that bad.”

you excuse yourself to get a drink from the kitchen. you can hear jake spitting out more questions like rapid fire to sunghoon as you walk away. you reach into the fridge, fishing out a water bottle.

behind you, jay enters quietly. “you two are cute together.”

you flinch at his voice, “geez, dude. almost gave me a heart attack.”

he chuckles under his breath and leans against the counter, “sorry, didn’t mean to scare you. i met sunghoon at freshman orientation and we immediately became friends, but i’ve never seen him like this.”

“really hoping you mean that in a good way.”

“don’t worry, it is. you know… he only has a soft spot for you. the three of us are his best friends but he only ever smiles like that with you.” he sways his head back and forth as he rambles, taking a pause between his words. “stay with him. it’ll be good for everyone.”

you smile at his approval, “you wanna know something? he actually said you would be the hardest to win over. he said something about you being super protective over your friends… yet, at the same time you trust their judgement. he told me that when he and i got together, he wasn’t scared to tell you but more worried as to if you would like me.”

he smiles with you now, “that all he said about me?” he asks while raising his eyebrows in curiosity.

“he also mentioned that you’re a good cook.”

viii. proud

a professor of yours is holding their annual spring showcase for contemporary art. every year, a handful of students are chosen to join and display their art amongst other renowned artists. you happen to be one of the few, a top contender chosen for your abilities.

you’ve invited your friends, including en-4 to come by the studio and see your work—albeit a bit nervous for their reactions. you stand on watch by your section, greeting the patrons and waiting for the boys to arrive.

thankfully, they show up within the first hour of the gallery opening. they each show up looking professional and chic, sporting all-black fits—most likely at the hands of jay. sunghoon immediately finding you and leading the way for the rest. you welcome them in, explaining your collection, the concentration being “vulnerability.” the works are a mix of several mediums, majority being oil paint, each displaying a closeup of various people. the paintings show their bare faces, imperfections and blemishes with nothing to hide.

the night continues with more and more passing by, complimenting your collection. by the time the exhibition ends, you and sunghoon are the only ones left in the studio. he’s stayed in the same spot, eyeing one piece incredibly closely. throughout the entire showcase, he had kept going back to the one canvas. you join his side, linking your arm with his. “this one is my favorite,” you hear him say.

you look up to meet his eyes, “why this one?”

“because…  it’s you.” you takes your arm out and moves to stand behind you, now wrapping himself around you and resting his chin in the crook of your neck. he holds your hands in his, “i am so proud of you. times like this, i am proud to call you my best friend.” he turns his head, kissing you once on your jaw, and then pulling slightly back to kiss you again on the cheek.

you turn around, hugging him closer with your arms around his shoulders, “thank you.” you hold each other for a few minutes. when you pull away, you lock eyes. you feel your heart beating against your chest and your breathing getting faster. you snap back to reality when you feel sunghoon’s lips on yours. you’re not sure why you tangle your fingers in his hair and kiss him back or why he grabs onto your waist while backing you into the wall. he continues placing pecks on the corner of you lips, creating a trail down to your neck. when you let out a sigh and say his name, he stops. there he stands, a few feet in front of you, awkward and unsure of what to do next.

he breaks the silence, “it’s late. i should drive you back home.” he watches as you slowly nod your head. the drive back to your apartment was dead silent. you tried to occupy yourself by looking out the window.

when he drops you off, he bids you a quick goodnight. “um… text me when you get back home.” sunghoon just looks forward, muttering “ok” before leaving.

in the elevator, you look at your reflection on the metal doors. you make your way inside your place and take a seat on your bed. your mind is too busy reliving the moments with sunghoon before. you try to comprehend what you should do but find yourself too tired, instead falling asleep and missing his text.

ix. spring break

it’s currently the middle of april and the boys have made you an honorary member of en-4. you and sunghoon have been pretending to be a couple and successfully tricking everyone for the last four months.

everyone has the week off for spring break. jay, being the generous guy he is, rented out a cabin in the mountains for the now five members of your friend group. you all rode in one car on the way up, and you totally didn’t fall asleep in the middle seat while cuddling into sunghoon’s side. 

you all decide to settle into your rooms once you arrive. “so there are four rooms, two downstairs and two upstairs.” jay pauses, looking towards you and sunghoon, “i assume that you’ll be fine sharing one.”

you immediately answer, “yeah, for sure.” you look to see sunghoon avoiding your gaze, sensing knowing looks from the others. sunghoon and you already guessed that they would make the two of you share a room and truthfully, neither of you minded. growing up together meant a lot of sleepovers and sharing beds so this was no problem.

he continues on, “great, you guys can take the master bedroom on the second floor cause it has the most space. i’ll take the room next to you, heeseung and jake can take the two down here.”

everyone agrees and sets off to their assigned rooms. you and sunghoon drop your bags onto the mattress, starting to unpack. the interior is spacious, the tall glass sliding doors allow lots of natural light to come in. the room itself is cozy, king size bed with matching bedside tables, and a big fluffy area rug. you’re too distracted to notice that sunghoon has gone outside to the balcony. he leans against the railing, taking in the scenic views and the breeze, basking in the setting rust-colored sun. when you finally realize that he’s not next to you anymore, you silently make you way onto the balcony, wrapping your arms around sunghoon from behind.

he tenses up at the sudden contact, relaxing when he realizes it’s you. there it is again, his heart is acting up like at the diner. he’s noticed it more often—the way that whenever he sees you, his heart beats differently. this weird feeling in his chest, this warmth that only shows up around you. he gets lost in his thoughts, envisioning what could become of your situation.

“what’s got you so lost?”

your voice snaps him back to reality. he turns around to face you, “uh… nothing, just thinking.”

just when you want to question him further and talk about what happened at the showcase, a knock is heard on the door. sunghoon walks away, going to open the door. both of you can feel the awkward tension when he leaves his spot. 

“hey, we’re kinda hungry so we’re gonna order some food and watch a movie downstairs,” jake informs you two when the door opens. “feel free to come down and join whenever.”

“yeah, we’ll be down in a bit,” sunghoon tells him as heeseung nods before leaving you two alone again. you both finish getting settled before heading downstairs. you gather around the couch as ponyo plays on the tv and you reach for a tray of sushi. 

the night continues, the moon sitting high amongst the stars. after the movie, dinner, and some drinking games, everyone retires to their respective rooms. you plop yourself onto the bed, tired after the day’s activities. you hear sunghoon getting something from his bag along with the rustling of some plastic. you crane your head up to see him approaching you. he sits on the edge of the bed, now with fluffy headbands and face masks in hand.

you scoot back a bit, “nope. no way you are getting me to do that.”

he laughs lightly at your antics, “oh come on… let me take care of you, at least just for tonight. please.” he gives you a pleading look with pursed lips, dragging out the “please” to show how desperate he is. 

that was the deciding point that led to a spa night. you both changed into comfier clothes, you borrowed one of his hoodies and sweatpants. sunghoon got settled in closer to you and you reached for his wrist to grab one of the elastic bands. you adjusted your position to sit on your knees, reaching up to tie his hair back. he, on the other hand, took one of the headbands to bring your hair back and away from your face. 

by the time midnight rolled around, you two were snuggled under the comforter with face masks, surrounded by junk food, and on the fourth episode of some random netflix show. as the night continues, a wave of sleep starts to overtake both of you. you help each other take off the masks and clean up, getting distracted every few minutes because one of you would start messing around. the boys had stopped by to say goodnight, catching you two in the middle of a mild pillow fight. after sending them off, you fall asleep in each other’s arms, basking in the warmth of your shared embrace. heeseung had snuck in at one point and stole a few quick pictures to tease you two with.

the dawn breaking through the sheer curtains causes you to stir in bed. you turn to see the alarm clock on the nightstand say 6:02. untangling yourself from sunghoon’s grasp, you sneak outside. you climb up to sit on the rooftop, feeling the cool chill of the dewy morning. the time alone gives you a sense of serenity.

meanwhile, sunghoon moves under the covers, confused why he can’t feel you. his eyes open and he doesn’t find a trace of you in the room. worried, he gets up and quietly searches the house, making sure to not wake the others. he goes into the backyard, seeing a shadow on the ground with an unusual shape. he looks up to find you perched on the roof, facing the opposite direction. he eventually climbs up to sit next to you. he hesitates before getting closer and putting his arm around you. you sigh as you lean into him. there you both stay, watching the sun come over the horizon in a comfortable silence.

x. disaster averted

the following week, you all return to campus. needless to say, the break was well used—the days at the cabin mostly being spent at the lake or around the campfire. another day spent hanging out at en-4’s dorm after classes. sunghoon went out to pick up food for everyone. you are in his room, trying to cram for an upcoming test and failing miserably because the other three are all playing fifa way too loud.

while the boys are playing, the doorbell rings. jay gets up to check who it is, seeing a young girl and immediately recognizing her. he lets in yeji, sunghoon’s little sister. she casually joins the boys around the tv, catching up on whatever has been happening in their lives. sunghoon arrives back home within twenty minutes. 

“i’m back with the food,” he shouts out loud enough for everyone to hear including you behind his closed bedroom door. he places the plastic bags on the table, looking up to see another face. “yeji? what are you doing here?”

she gets up to greet her brother, giving him a hug, “it’s my spring break and i wanted to stop by.” sunghoon then realizes that his family doesn’t know about him becoming friends with you again or about your current situation. he drags her into the kitchen hurriedly, “ok so here’s the thing… you remember y/n?”

“of course! she’s like my big sister.”

his breath gets caught in his throat for a second, “yeah, don’t call her that. anyways, her and i are friends again,” he sees yeji’s eyes widen with excitement and continues with his explanation before she can cut him off, “and she’s my girlfriend.”

“what?!”

sunghoon panics and covers her mouth with his palm, “fake girlfriend!” he rushes out the whisper. “the guys don’t know that our relationship isn’t real and i’d like to keep it that way. they don’t even know that we were friends beforehand. yeji, i’m begging you to go along with it. please do this for me.” he clasps his hands together in front of him with a pleading expression.

the young girl crosses her arms in front of her and pretends to think about it, “hmm… fine.”

sunghoon blurts out a chant of “thank you’s” not knowing that his sister only agreed cause she always thought that you and sunghoon would’ve been a good couple. he tells her to help the others set the table while he goes to you. he quickly explains what’s happening and you’re just excited that you get to see yeji again. you both leave his room and you make your own way to the living room, spotting the other girl and exchanging glances.

yeji stops what she’s doing to turn and face you, “who’s this?”

you answer back casually, “y/n. i’m a friend of the boys, and you are?”

“yeji, sunghoon’s younger sister.” she says it proudly, bringing a grin to the aforementioned boy.

“oh, you’re yeji? hoon was right… you are pretty.”

she tilts her head and cocks an eyebrow, questioning you “why would he tell you about me?”

jake chimes in like it’s second nature, “i mean, why wouldn’t he tell his girlfriend about his sister?” he states like it’s so obvious. “they’ve been together since december.”

“girlfriend?” she takes a step back in false shock, “since december? why didn’t i know about this?” 

“what? i don’t seem like your brother’s type?”

“it’s not that. i’m just surprised he managed to get and keep a girlfriend. you’re like, way out of his league and he’s a loser.” one thing to know about yeji is that as much as she loves him, she will never miss a chance to tease her brother. 

with a scoff, you finally hear sunghoon join in beside you, “not gonna lie, that one hurt a little.”

“i’m so telling mom,” she says with a mischievous smirk.

you laugh at sunghoon’s shocked face and smile at the younger park, “i like you, i think we’ll get along just fine.”

“i like you, too.” she looks at sunghoon, “keep her.”

everyone laughs at the interaction as they settle in to eat. sunghoon sits to your right while yeji sits on your left, wondering how his two favorite girls learned to be such good actresses.

xi. returning the favor

fast forward another month, the end of the semester means the dreaded finals week again. sunghoon has been, for lack of a better word, slacking on some of his classes and is now juggling to prepare for exams and revisions. couple that with yeji telling his mom about your “relationship” and her nonstop questions, all of this stress has been piled on. this all amounting to him getting sick. 

now, sunghoon being sunghoon means that he pushed everyone away and hasn’t told you about his condition. luckily for him, you’ve been cooped up in your studio trying to finish your portfolio and also prepare for your exams. unluckily for him, the boys have gotten worried and heeseung called you. 

which brings us to the present, sunghoon stuck in bed with a fever, congestion, and neglected notes. a knock on his door does nothing to help his headache but seeing your face meekly peek in makes him relax. “what are you doing here?” he asks hoarsely.

“did you really think i wouldn’t find out?”

he avoids your glare, “i didn’t want you to worry.”

“honestly i’m not upset that you’re sick, but that i had to hear it from your roommates.” you come closer to him, clearing out the scattered papers and textbooks from atop his bed. you sit on the edge, taking out some medicine and cooling packs that you picked up from the convenience store.

“you really don’t have to do this,” he twiddles his fingers in embarrassment.

you tie back his hair and place one of the packs on his forehead, “you’ve always been the one taking care of me, so i might as well return the favor.” 

you busy yourself with getting the cough medicine ready and sunghoon takes an actual look at you. he notices that you’re wearing his old skating jacket, the same one he gave you at your high school graduation. he makes more room under the covers, allowing you to come closer and lay next to him. he drapes one arm over you and holds onto the end of the jacket sleeve, “i can’t believe you kept this.”

“we stopped hanging out and we weren’t in each other’s lives for a year and a half after being together basically since birth,” you pause, a little saddened thinking back. “this was the last thing i ever got from you. it’s all i had left.”

he brings you closer, neither of you caring if you got sick. “well… now you have me again. for good.”

xii. the party

the end of the school year has finally arrived. some seniors from the txt frat are hosting a big party to celebrate. of course, en-4 was invited—mostly thanks to heeseung being close with them. although you have made more friends and now have a more active social life, parties are still not your thing. 

yet, much to your dismay, being friends with designated party people means that you’re getting bombarded with pleas to go regardless. sunghoon took the lead on convincing you, “please, i promise that it’ll be fun.” the boys join in, their voices overlapping. sunghoon practically tackles you onto your couch while pouting and furrowing his eyebrows in desperation.

“stop looking at me like that. i can’t think properly when you do that.”

right on cue, the boys start to tease you. jay clears his throat and jake makes kissing noises, meanwhile heeseung starts singing y/n and sunghoon sitting in a tree… while you just glare at them.

“if i say i’ll go, will you all leave me alone?” 

they all shout “yes” in unison. which is how you ended up at the crowded frat house. although they had begged you to come, they practically abandon you and sunghoon when you get there. jake had yelled back to you that his friend sunoo from his econ class called them over for beer pong.

you and sunghoon find a big bean bag in the corner and stay there for a bit. he offers to get you both some drinks and leaves to the kitchen. you’re not sure how long he’s gone but you eventually get uncomfortable. you start wandering the house for some space to get some air. you find an empty room and make your way into the connected bathroom to wash your face. you take some deep breaths, then realizing that you didn’t tell sunghoon. as you’re about to step out, he enters the room.

“i figured you would want some space.”

“how’d you know where i was?”

he comes up closer to you, “in the sea of people, in this mess, in this frenzy… i will always find you. no matter what happens or who comes into my life, i always find my way back to you.”

“what the hell is that even supposed to mean, park?”

“i mean…” he stops to compose himself, “oh for fucks sake, i’m tired of this being pretend. i’m tired of being allowed to call you my girlfriend in public but not treat you like it in private. when i kissed you at the showcase, i had wanted to do that for so long, and i’ve been wanting to do even more.”

“sunghoon, look-”

“wait, i’m not done. what i’m trying to say is that i want you to be my girlfriend, for real this time—not as a joke, not as a trick. i want us to be together as an actual couple because i like you, a lot more than you could believe-”

you cut him off this time, kissing him like he did all those weeks ago. you kissed him in the way that you weren’t sure what words to say other than, “i would love to be your girlfriend.”

sunghoon shines with the biggest smile, picking you up and spinning around. when he lets you down, he incessantly leaves pecks all over your face. he holds you close, “now, how about we go enjoy the party?”

you nod and lead him hand in hand towards the door. you turn the nob, only to have the three remaining members of your friend group fall at your feet. heeseung landing on top, shouting out, “i fucking knew it!”

#sunghoon #park sunghoon #sunghoon fluff #park sunghoon fluff #sunghoon imagine #sunghoon imagines #sunghoon fic #sunghoon fics #enhypen #enhypen sunghoon #enhypen imagine #enhypen imagines #enhypen fic #enhypen fics #enhypen fluff #enhypen sunghoon imagines #enhypen sunghoon fics #enhypen sunghoon fluff

[adorerdraco]

I’m Here ✧ Draco x Reader

Request: Hi, so I’m not sure if you’re taking these kinds of fics for Draco, but I’ve been feeling really down lately, and I was wondering if you could write a one shot or a scenario where the reader has been having a really bad day/week and Draco comforts them? And maybe Draco lays the reader on his chest and he hums a small tune to make the reader feel better? You can ignore this if it’s an issue, but I’d really appreciate it. I love all of your fics btw! They make me really happy <3

Warnings: none bc mostly fluff, some tears, super soft!draco

Words: 1.9K

A/N: i saw this and had to do it effective immediately bc i am feeling the exact same wayyy so this was really nice to think about ;( thank you so much for requesting this and for reading my stuff and i’m so glad i can help in a way <3 i’m sending you nothing but peace, love, and light !!! but i really hope this is gooood <3 do not own gif

Life was punishing you, you thought. It had to be. Because there was no way how in the span of a week everything in your day-to-day life had gone from okay to borderline catastrophic. It was as if every situation you were in was taking its form in the worst case possible scenario and all you could do was watch hopelessly as things continuously got worse sprinkled with small misfortunes in between.

It started on a regular Monday morning, sitting down for breakfast in the Great Hall with blissful ignorance. Halfway through eating your toast, your owl had come in through the open large glass windows and dropped a letter onto your plate from home that left you some very unfortunate news and had set forth a ripple effect that began making everything else go downhill as your days progressed. By the end of the school week, you had managed to blow up a potion, lose house points because of said potion when it splashed onto some people and had some physically altering effects, tripped over your footing and fell in the middle of a crowded corridor, failed a surprise quiz, forgot to turn in an essay, got into an argument with a friend, accidentally slept in and missed a morning class, and took a trip to the hospital wing for a migraine that didn’t want to leave you alone. You could’ve sworn you had somehow been thrown into purgatory, or limbo, or something outer-worldly. 

“Are you alright?” Draco had asked you right after breakfast that Monday morning as he was walking you to your first class. “What was in the letter your owl gave you? You look worried.”

“It was nothing,” you dismissed quickly, trying to put on a half-hearted smile while you spoke to make it more convincing. “I’m fine, just tired.”

It was the beginning of the week, and he did keep you up late the night before when you were sneaking around together, so he just shook his head up and down and took your excuse even though he felt like there was more to it than you were letting on. But as the days went on, he was becoming more observant of the way you were acting and even looking. He didn’t like that every morning he saw the shadows under your eyes get deeper and darker, and he didn’t like how you would close your eyes in pain when you would groan about your headache. He also didn’t like the way he hadn’t seen you truly smile or laugh all week even when he tried countless times to amuse you or cheer you up. But what he didn’t like most of all was that he felt like there was nothing he could do. 

On Wednesday afternoon, he tried asking you again. You were sitting in the Quad with him on a bench and he was telling you a story from earlier in the day about how he had ‘accidentally’ tripped this Gryffindor boy and got Snape to take away house points from him that he thought for sure would you make laugh or perhaps give him a disapproving redirection, but when he glanced up to see your reaction, he noticed you weren’t even listening, to begin with. You had been staring down at your shoes and the way they lined up against the cracks in the pavement, kicking around some gravel as your mind was running a million thoughts per second.

“Love?” He said to you softly. You looked up at him swiftly with a quiet questioning hum, e/c eyes widened slightly from being ripped away from your thoughts suddenly. “You know if something’s bothering you, you can talk to me.”

“I know,” you nodded warmly. “I’m okay, Dray. I’m honestly just tired.”

And you were telling the truth, in a sense. You really were tired; physically, mentally, emotionally.

He frowned, dissatisfied with your answer. “Right, well if anything at all comes up, I’m here.”

From then on, Draco took it upon himself to try and increase his affections and compliments. He would hug you a little tighter, kiss you a little longer, whisper sweet little nothings into your ear before he left you for class. You felt a little bad lying to him, withholding the truth from him, and you saw the concern in his light gray’s when you’d meet him in the mornings and for the rest of the day, but it only made you feel a tad bit worse. You were starting to feel guilty for the way he was worrying, feeling like you were dragging him down into the dumps with you and raining on his usual carefree parades.

On Friday morning, you didn’t meet him for breakfast and you were out of the Great Hall faster than he could catch you. He felt like a stalker when he walked by your class, peeking his head in to see if you were there and well. He spotted you sitting at your desk, hunched over your unopened books with a grimace on your face and your head in your hands. He wanted to go in and whisk you away to somewhere far and quiet, but the Professor had caught him by the door and sent him on his way before he could even think of doing anything of the sort.

You felt the day had gone by extremely slow, relative to how the week was moving and also impossibly dismal. You were counting down the minutes until the end of the school day, ready to run to your dorm right after your last class and bury yourself deep into your duvet and pillows for the rest of the weekend.

Head still pounding, you trudged over to your final class, stopping outside the doors when you saw a small group of your housemates standing around with unnerved expressions as they passed each other papers and spoke in hushed tensed tones.

“I studied all night but my friend took the test earlier and she told me during lunch that it had stuff on it that wasn’t even in the reading!” You heard one exclaim in distress.

“We have a test?” You accidentally said aloud and a pair of eyes turned to look at you confusingly.

“Yeah? Professor’s been telling us all week.”

A scoff of disbelief escaped your lips, an overwhelming sense of defeat washing over you as you turned briskly on your heel and in the opposite direction of your classroom. Tears started pricking at your eyes, you felt the stinging of them wanting to be released but you refused to let them all out in the open and especially in front of people who were still taking their time to head to their classes. 

You were making a beeline towards your common room, blinking rapidly to try and clear your vision that was quickly pooling with unshed tears while trying to steady your breathing in another failed attempt to calm yourself. You were nearly there, you could tell by the paintings and doors that you passed by and the black stain splattered on the floor you saw every day on your way to the dorms from someone’s dropped ink bottle that Filch hasn’t been able to get rid of. 

Almost there, you kept repeatedly reminding yourself.

All hope of solace was gone when you didn’t notice the body you had unknowingly crashed into. All you felt were strong hands around your biceps, holding you in place from toppling backward and the very familiar scent of expensive cologne and mint.

“Y/N? Why aren’t you in class?” You looked up at the platinum blond sadly, his worried eyes searching yours with such care that it pushed you over the edge.

You didn’t answer him and instead wrapped your arms tightly around Draco’s middle, burying your face deep into his robes and letting out quiet and frail weeps that broke his heart. He held you tightly, pressing kisses to the top of your head and muttering soft “I’m here’s” into your hair. You stayed in his embrace for a few minutes, letting your tears freely fall into his vest with a sense of relief that only he was able to give you at this point in time.

“I’m sorry I cried on you,” you choked out when you pulled away from him, desperately wiping away at your eyes with the back of your sleeve.

“You don’t ever have to apologize for that,” he said quickly. He brought his hand up to your face, his thumb swiping delicately over a stray tear that was sitting on your jaw while you closed your eyes in comfort. “Do you want to go back to my room? I can set you up really nicely and we can talk if you’d like?”

“Yes please, I’d like that a lot.”

Draco interlocked your fingers with his, bringing the pair up to his lips with a warm kiss on the back of your hand before walking the two of you over to the entrance of the Slytherin common room. It was empty when you walked in, not a soul in sight since everyone was still in class and it made it much easier for him to sneak you into his singular Prefect room you were now extremely grateful he had. He watched contently when you shed off your robes and kicked off your shoes and immediately slipped into one of his dark green jumpers that fit you big. 

You were perched on the edge of his bed, his scent from his sweater engulfing you and doing a much better job of calming you down than you wanted to admit. He followed in your footsteps and changed into something comfier and when he finally sat beside you with his hand falling over yours as an encouragement to talk - you did. You vented to him all about the letter from home, the migraine, your classes, the argument between you and your friend, and everything else that came to mind.

“And I feel bad for ignoring you and not telling you all this before but I didn’t want to burden you,” you finished with sniffles, gazing up at him with a gloomy expression. 

“Y/N, I love you, and nothing you say to me is a burden,” he frowned slightly, “when I tell you I’m here, I mean it, for anything. You’re so important to me and it kills me to see you upset.”

In a careful movement, he had scooted towards you and affectionately cupped your face before placing a loving kiss on your forehead and murmured to you, “don’t ever hesitate to come to me.”

You let him pull you under his covers, draping his large duvet over your entangled bodies with your head resting right above his chest, the steady beatings of his heart instantly sending you into a much-needed peace. His chin was rested right atop your head and you felt his fingers run up and down your arm soothingly while he thought.

“Is there anything else I can do to make you feel better?” He asked quietly.

“Can you help me fall asleep?” you muttered, closing your eyes gently when his hand smoothed over the back of your hair. You felt him nod against your head and after a small moment silence, you heard him begin to hum the faint tune of your favorite song.

You lied there in bliss, enjoying the way his chest was vibrating against your ear and the way his fingers were playing with the ends of your hair, curling the strands around his fingers and then moving upwards to massage your scalp. And for a minute, everything was finally okay again as you drifted off into a peaceful sleep, a full heart and with your love calmly lulling you away with a soft and now distant humming.

#Draco Malfoy #draco lucius malfoy #draco malfoy fic #draco malfoy fanfiction #draco malfoy x reader #draco malfoy x y/n #draco malfoy x you #draco malfoy x slytherin #draco malfoy x gryffindor #draco malfoy x ravenclaw!reader #draco malfoy x hufflepuff!reader #draco malfoy angst #draco malfoy fluff #draco malfoy imagine #draco malfoy blurb #draco malfoy drabble #draco fanfiction #draco x reader #draco x you #draco x y/n #harry potter fandom #harry potter fanfiction #harry potter writing #harry potter imagine #Harry Potter

[leahkenobi]

better

remus lupin x fem! reader

word count: 1.6k

summary: you walk in on remus in a compromising position.

warnings: scars, mentions of blood and some medical stuff, rem being insecure

a/n: hello everyone!! this is my first time writing for this character, so lmk what you think. also, my requests for remus, sirius, and james are open, so if you have any ideas, i’d be happy to give it a shot. i also have a taglist, so if you would like to be added (remus or marauders or everything i write), lmk! i hope you all enjoy, i know this may not be my best work! gif is from pinterest!

you were a scatter brained mess on the chilly thursday afternoon when you decided the only thing that would make you feel any better was seeing remus.

remus was more than just a friend. he was a comforting hug, a stroke to your hair to calm you down, a kiss to the cheek before you left. and right now, you were in desperate need of all of those things.

school was stressful lately. it felt like that no matter how many things you would wipe off your plate, you would always end up with another test or another essay deadline looming over your head.

today was one of those days you just needed a break. you needed to see rem, drink tea with him, put on one of his sweaters, and read books with him, so you set off to his dorm.

it wasn’t an abnormal thing for you to do. he often times stopped in your room, too. so when you gave a single knock and walked straight into the unlocked dorm room, you were not expecting to see what laid before you.

your head that was down snapped up at the sound of a small gasp, belonging to remus. because there he was, bare except for his trousers, back turned to you in an attempt to hide his face. his hair was dripping, his back an angry red from the hot shower he had clearly just left.

“oh god rem- i… i’m so sorry i should’ve waited-“ you stumbled out.

it was then, while you were staring at his back turned to you that you noticed the scars. the scars that you had always seen, no matter how hard he tried to hide them from you. but this time it was different. they were out, open, and horrifying.

just looking at them made you want to throw up. not because of how they looked, no that would never cause such a reaction. it was for the sheer pain he must have been in to gain a scar like that.

remus let out a defeated sigh and said quietly, “it’s okay.”

with that, he slowly turned to face you. you couldn’t have prepared for the sight you were going to see.

across his midsection was a gash so red and angry looking, it was unlike anything you had seen before. it looked fresh, which was the most concerning part.

“rem… oh my god. sit down please. holy shit, when did that happen?” you said as you closed in on him, trying to get him to sit on his bed.

“i’m fine, really y/n. what’s going on with you? is there something wrong, love?” he asked, so nonchalantly, as if blood was not slowly starting to trickle from the open wound.

“‘is there something wrong?’ remus john lupin would you look at yourself! please sit and let me help you before we can even talk about what is ‘wrong,’” you said. you couldn’t believe his calmness at his situation.

“y/n, really it’s okay. pomfrey has already had a look. don’t worry,” he responded, but plopped on his bed nonetheless.

as you looked down at him, seeing how pale he looked, seeing that soft trickle of blood, your hands began to shake in nervousness. what the hell was going on?

“i’ll be right back. i’m going to run and grab a cloth to get you cleaned up,” you said, voice breaking a bit.

before you could move to the bathroom, remus stopped you.

“y/n, i’m okay. don’t worry, i promise, and i wouldn’t lie to you,” he said, his voice completely steady.

“when i get back, i want the full story,” you said as you slowly pulled away.

remus knew in that moment that he would have to tell you, that he couldn’t keep this part of him away from you any longer.

————————————

you returned a few minutes later, a warm, wet cloth in one hand, and an arm full of bandages and salve in the other.

“y/n, seriously, this is all a bit unneces-“

“lupin you keep that mouth closed. you are actively bleeding on your bed. now would you lay back and let me clean you up?” you demanded.

“yes ma’am,” he said, though he knew that if a shower wouldn’t stop the bleeding, nor would a cloth. but he was willing to let you try. for your sake, he would let you do what you needed to do.

he lay back on his bed as you sat on the corner of it. carefully, you laid the cloth across his bleeding abdomen. you were putting light pressure on the wound when he let out a hiss of pain.

“i’m sorry, i’m sorry,” you said apologetically as you continued trying to clean him up.

“not your fault,” he said as he bit down on his tongue, attempting to silence the pain.

eventually, the bleeding had slowed enough to the point where you could put salve on it and wrap it.

you reached for the jar of salve when his hand met your wrist, preventing you from reaching forward.

“seriously y/n, you don’t need to put that on me. i’ll be fine,” remus said.

“rem,” you were practically begging at this point, “just let me take care of you. you need help, so let me.”

with that, he released your wrist, giving up on fighting you as you picked up the jar.

“this may be a bit cold,” you said as you spread it across his stomach.

he did release a shaky breath, though he recovered quickly. his face melted into one of relief as the salve slowed the burning sensation of the gash.

you finished applying it, then said quietly, “can you sit up?”

he nodded in agreement, then briefly struggled to sit. with your help, he finally found himself in the upright position.

“i’m just going to wrap this around you, okay?” you said and he nodded again. his face was blank, as if he was completely emotionless.

the fact that he wasn’t responding to you was worrisome. it’s as if the energy in the room changed completely. it went from remus being incredibly stubborn to silence and solemnity.

once you finished wrapping him, you walked in front of him. you grabbed his hand out of his lap.

“rem, are you alright?” you said.

when he wouldn’t look you in the eyes, or even nod, you pinched his chin between your fingers and lifted his head.

“rem?” you questioned, with concern evident in your voice.

he met your eyes, and your heart plummeted to your stomach. he looked just on the verge of tears, but nonetheless told you he was “fine.”

“what’s going on, hm? how’d this happen?” you asked gentler, just trying to get it out of him. sure you came in here with your own problems, but this took precedent. clearly whatever had happened was serious, and you wanted to be here to help.

“i’m alright, just a mishap,” he said emotionlessly.

“please don’t lie to me,” you said, pleading him to let you in, let you help.

“really y/n i’m okay, it was just an accident,” remus said, his argumentativeness shining through, his final attempt to stop you, to stop himself from telling you the truth.

“but you’re hur-“

“i’m fine-“

“would you stop saying that!” you shouted.

“remus, you are not okay. let me in. tell me who did this to you, let me help,” you said at this point, physically falling to your knees.

he looked down at you, with something that looked like fear as he came clean.

“i did this to myself,” remus said, sounding like a meek little boy.

“what?” you said perplexed at how that was even possible.

“once a month… i… well…” he said, “i uh- i transform. into a werewolf.”

you were stunned for a moment before you cracked.

“oh remus,” you said, embracing him. you wrapped your arm around his neck, burrowing your face in his warmth.

he was stunned at the comfort, having expected nothing but the end of a friendship, a friendship that even he knew was more than that.

“why didn’t you tell me?” you asked.

“i thought you would’ve been scared of me,” he said in a mumble, voice soft and timid.

“i could never be scared of you, do you here me?” you said moving your head out of his neck to look him in the eye.

“i just thought-“ he started, but you caught him.

“don’t think, then remus. i’m not leaving you,” you said, and it was something about the way you were in his arms, the eye contact you were holding, maybe even the way those words came out of your mouth with such tenderness that made remus lean in.

his lips captured yours, but only for a moment. the second he met your mouth, he knew he had made a mistake.

you, on the other hand, were upset that he pulled away.

“i’m so sorry,” he said, attempting to wriggle away from you.

“why? did you not mean it?” you asked.

“no… no i did, but i… you weren’t ready a-and it’s a bad time,” he rambled.

“remus there is no bad time. in fact, it’s a wonderful time, i’ve been waiting for so long,” you said.

“are you sure?” he asked, still feeling badly about the way he kissed you.

“i’m more than sure rem, please do it again,” you said impatiently.

he leaned in again, kissing you deeper this time. his tongue slid past your lips and you delighted in the sounds he made.

you kissed for what could’ve been days, all sense of time lost with him on you.

when you finally parted, remus couldn’t help but smirk at you.

“what?” you asked, giggling with him.

“just not how i thought this conversation would go,” he said.

“better, i hope?” you questioned him.

“much better.”

taglist:

@oliviajdjarin

#remus lupin x reader #remus lupin #remus lupin fic #marauders fluff #marauders fic #the marauders #remus x reader #remus x y/n #harry potter #marauders era #remus lupin x you #remus lupin fluff #remus lupin angst